ESTIMATION OF THE FREQUENCY OF GENETIC VARIANTS ASSOCIATED WITH VITAMIN D LEVELS AND OSTEOPOROSIS IN THE POPULATION OF UKRAINE

Abstract

Circulating vitamin D levels and the risk of osteoporosis have significant inheritance. Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the GC, DHCR7/NADSYN1, CYP2R1, CYP24A1, and SEC23A genes have shown significant association with these conditions in previous genome-wide association studies (GWAS). Objective: to study the frequency of alleles associated with circulating levels of vitamin D and osteoporosis in the cohort of Ukrainians, as well as to compare the frequencies of these variants with individuals of Western and Northern European origin. Materials and Methods. This paper presents the results of the study of the frequencies of genomic variants associated with vitamin D levels and osteoporosis in a cohort of 97 Ukrainians based on genome data obtained by whole genome sequencing (WGS), as well as comparing their frequencies with the combined European population (CEU) of the "1000 genomes" project (persons of Western and Northern European ancestry). Files with the primary publicly available genomic data of Ukrainians were annotated using ANNOVAR and SNPEff software using the reference database of the human genome version hg38. Comparison of allele frequencies between populations was performed using Fisher's exact test using the number of alleles in the two studied populations and the construction of conjugated 2x2 tables. Results. It was found that of the 22 single nucleotide polymorphisms included in the analysis, 10, namely rs2282679; rs4855; rs10033936; rs3755967; rs17467825; rs12639968; rs1155563; rs17216707; rs10745742; rs180119, significantly differ in the Ukrainian cohort comparatively to CEU. Using correlation analysis, we also found that the genotypes of SNPs rs3755967, rs17467825, rs2282679 and rs4855 in Ukrainians are completely correlated with each other (r = 1), which means that they are in a state of complete linkage in Ukrainians of the given cohorts. Conclusion. Such findings may be the evidence of evolutionary and adaptation processes in the regulation of vitamin D levels and bone mineral density in the population of Ukraine and requires further studies of phenotype-genotype relationship.