Abstract
It is reasonable to suppose that poor diet underlies the unfavorable health status of the Roma population of Europe. Previously in the framework of a complex health survey, fruit and vegetable consumption, quantity of sugar added, salting frequency; bitter, salty, sweet and fat taste preferences were evaluated of Hungarian (HG, n = 410) and Roma (HR, n = 387) populations. In the present study the associations of taste and food preferences with TAS1R3, CD36, SCNN1B, TRPV1, TAS2R38, TAS2R19 and CA6 polymorphisms were tested in the same samples. Genotype frequencies did not differ significantly between the two populations. Although we initially observed associations between certain genetic polymorphisms and taste and food preferences in our study samples, none of the p values remained significant after the multiple test correction. However, some of our results could be considered promising (0.05<corrected p < 0.20), which showed potential ethnicity-specific effects (CA6 rs2274333 with salty taste and raw kohlrabi preference, CD36 rs1527483 with fat taste preference, TAS2R19 rs10772420 with grapefruit preference, and TAS2R38 rs713598 with quantity of sugar added). Our results may suggest that genetics may mediate food preferences, and individuals with different ethnic background may require personalized interventions to modify diet. Further investigations with greater sample sizes are essential to explore the effect of these genetic variants on taste and food preferences.
Highlights
Suboptimal diet is a major risk factor for unfavorable health status, contributing to the development of metabolic abnormalities and consequent noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) of public health signifi cance (Astrup, Dyerberg, Selleck, & Stender, 2008; World Cancer Research Fund, 2018)
Dietary behaviors are different among and within ethnic minorities compared to majority populations (Leung & Stanner, 2011), suggesting that factors influencing eating habits may vary in ethnic minority groups (Satia-Abouta, Patterson, Neuhouser, & Elder, 2002)
HG: Hungarian general population, HR: Hungarian Roma population, single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs): single nucleotide polymorphism, odds ratios (ORs)= odds ratio, 95% CI: 95% confidence interval
Summary
Suboptimal diet is a major risk factor for unfavorable health status, contributing to the development of metabolic abnormalities and consequent noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) of public health signifi cance (type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular diseases and cancer) (Astrup, Dyerberg, Selleck, & Stender, 2008; World Cancer Research Fund, 2018). Dietary risks were responsible for 11 million deaths in 2017, and found to be unevenly distributed within populations (GBD Collaborators, 2019). Dietary behaviors are different among and within ethnic minorities compared to majority populations (Leung & Stanner, 2011), suggesting that factors influencing eating habits may vary in ethnic minority groups (Satia-Abouta, Patterson, Neuhouser, & Elder, 2002). The genetic background of taste and related food preferences has been widely studied and found that individual taste preferences may be explained by genetic variations (Dioszegi, Lla naj, & Adany, 2019). An estimate of genetic influence on perceived sensitivity, intensity and preference of standard prototypical tastants is expressed in terms of heritability (h2), which describes the proportion of the variance in a trait that is due to additive genetic factors. Heritability estimates range from high to moderate for bitter tasting compounds [0.72, 0.71, 0.34, for 6-n-propylthiouracil (PROP) (Hansen, Reed, Wright, Martin, & Breslin, 2006), phenylthiocarbamide (PTC)
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