Research article

Association of single-nucleotide polymorphisms in RHOB and TXNDC3 with knee osteoarthritis susceptibility: two case-control studies in East Asian populations and a meta-analysis

Dongquan Shi^1,2 , Takahiro Nakamura³ , Masahiro Nakajima⁴ , Jin Dai^1,2 , Jianghui Qin¹ , Haijian Ni¹ , Yong Xu¹ , Chen Yao¹ , Jia Wei⁵ , Baorui Liu⁵ , Shiro Ikegawa⁴ and Qing Jiang^1,2

¹The Center of Diagnosis and Treatment for Joint Disease, Drum Tower Hospital Affiliated to Medical School of Nanjing University, 321 Zhongshan Road, Nanjing 210008, Jiangsu, China

²Laboratory for Bone and Joint Diseases, Model Animal Research Center, Nanjing University, Zhongshan Road 321, Nanjing 210061, Jiangsu, China

³Laboratory for Mathematics, Premedical Course, National Defense Medical College, 3-2 Namiki, Tokorozawa, Saitama, 359-8513 Japan

⁴Laboratory for Bone and Joint Diseases, Center for Genomic Medicine, RIKEN, 4-6-1 Shirokanedai, Minato-ku, Tokyo 108-8639, Japan

⁵Department of Oncology, Drum Tower Hospital Affiliated to Medical School of Nanjing University, Zhongshan Road 321, Nanjing 210008, Jiangsu, China

author email corresponding author email

Arthritis Research & Therapy 2008, 10:R54doi:10.1186/ar2423

Published:	10 May 2008

Abstract

Introduction

Conflicting findings on the association of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in RHOB and TXNDC3 with susceptibility to knee osteoarthritis (OA) have been reported in European Caucasians. To examine the associations of these SNPs with OA in East Asian populations and to evaluate their global significance, we conducted two case-control studies in 955 Chinese and 750 Japanese patients.

Methods

We genotyped the previously implicated SNPs rs585017 (in RHOB) and rs4720262 (in TXNDC3) in patients with primary symptomatic knee OA with radiographic confirmation and in matched control individuals, and analyzed their associations. We further conducted a meta-analysis of the study findings together with those of previously reported European studies using the DerSimonian-Laird procedure.

Results

A significant association of RHOB with knee OA was observed in male Chinese patients (P = 0.02). No significant associations were found for RHOB in any other comparisons in the East Asian populations. The association of TXNDC3 was replicated in Chinese female (P = 0.04) and Japanese (P = 0.03) patients, although none of these associations persisted after Bonferroni correction. Significant association (P = 0.02 for the allelic frequency) with nonsignificant heterogeneity was found in the East Asian replication study. No significant association was found in any comparison in the meta-analysis for all studies.

Conclusion

Our study replicates the association, previously reported in European Caucasians, of TXNDC3 with knee OA susceptibility in an East Asian population.