• Journal of Life Science
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• v.18 no.12
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• pp.1733-1738
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• 2008

SLC6A18, one of the neurotransmitters, was reported the possible relationship to hypertension, and it contained eight blocks of minisatellites. In this study, SLC6A18-MS5 sequence which showed the highest heterozygosity among seven minisatellites was analyzed using the Transfac software, the putative binding sites for the transcription factor Pax4 and HNF4 were discovered as a result. The HNF4 is involved in the diabetes pathway and suggested the relationship to hypertension. Thus, we investigated the putative functional significance of allelic variation in this minisatellites with respect to susceptibility for hypertension. To address this possibility, we analyzed genomic DNA from the blood of 301 hypertension-free controls and 184 cases with hypertension. A statistically significant association was not identified between the allelic distribution of SLC6A18-MS5 and occurrence of hypertension. We then examined the meiotic segregation of SLC6A18-MS5 and it was transmitted following Mendelian inheritance. Therefore, this locus could be useful markers for paternity mapping and DNA fingerprinting. Moreover, we undertook a comprehensive analysis of the genomic sequence to address the evolutionary events of these variable repeats. SLC6A18 minisatellites regions are only conserved in human and primates. This result suggestedthat intronic minisatellites analysis is powerful evolution marker for the non-coding regions in primates and can provide a great insight to the molecular evolution of repeated region in primates.