title: Diversity of alleles encoding HLA-B40: relative frequencies in united states populations and description of five novel alleles.
abstract: The frequency of each B*40 allele was determined by DNA sequencing in four major United States populations: Caucasians, African Americans, Asians/Pacific Islanders, and Hispanics. Thirty-two individuals from each ethnic group, who were previously described serologically as B40, B60, or B61, were randomly selected out of a pool of 82,979 unrelated individuals for allele characterization. Out of nine different B*40 alleles identified in this study, B*4001 and B*4002 were the two most frequent B*40 alleles in all the population groups. B*4001 was the primary B*40 allele seen in Caucasians (83%) and African Americans (76%), while B*4002 was found in the majority of Hispanics (62%). The distributions of both alleles were comparable in the Asian/Pacific Islander population. These two alleles were the only B*40 alleles detected in Caucasians while four to five additional B*40 alleles were seen in the other population groups. The other B*40 alleles detected in this study included: B*4003 and B*4010 in Asian/Pacific Islanders; B*4012 and B*4016 in African Americans; and B*4004, B*4006, and B*4027 in Hispanics. Analysis revealed significant differences between Hispanics and all other groups as well as between African Americans and Asian/Pacific Islanders. This report also describes five novel B*40 alleles: B*4019, B*4020, B*4024, B*4027, and B*4028.
authors.affiliation: Immunology Unit, Department of Microbiology, Faculty of Medicine, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, Thailand.
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Pimtanothai
authors.forename: G A
authors.initials: GA
authors.lastname: Rizzuto
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Slack
authors.forename: N K
authors.initials: NK
authors.lastname: Steiner
authors.forename: C A
authors.initials: CA
authors.lastname: Kosman
authors.forename: P F
authors.initials: PF
authors.lastname: Jones
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Koester
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ng
authors.forename: R J
authors.initials: RJ
authors.lastname: Hartzman
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Katovich Hurley
mesh_terms: D000483:Alleles; D005787:Gene Frequency; D014644:Genetic Variation; D015235:HLA-B Antigens / Q000145:classification / Q000235:genetics*; D059947:HLA-B40 Antigen; D014481:United States
chemical_list: D015235:HLA-B Antigens; D059947:HLA-B40 Antigen; C081918:HLA-B60 antigen; C079077:HLA-B61 antigen