Family-based associations between the angiotensin- converting enzyme insertion/deletion polymorphism and multiple cardiovascular risk factors in Chinese.
OBJECTIVE
We investigated, in a sample of Chinese families, the associations of body mass index (BMI), blood pressure (BP), serum lipids, fasting plasma glucose, serum creatinine and uric acid with the insertion/deletion (I/D) polymorphism of the angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) gene.


METHODS
We genotyped 902 subjects from 186 nuclear families recruited in Shanghai, China, via a specialized hypertension clinic. We performed family-based association analyses for continuous and dichotomous phenotypic measurements using the quantitative and sib- transmission/disequilibrium tests (QTDT and Sib-TDT), respectively.


RESULTS
The study sample included 121 parents and 781 offspring from 25 two-parent families, 71 one-parent families, and 90 families without parental information. The median number of offspring was four (range from 2 to 10). Of the 654 (85.4%) hypertensive offspring, 458 took antihypertensive drugs. The 354 male offspring were slightly younger than the 427 female siblings (48.1 versus 49.2 years, P = 0.03), but they had similar BMI (25.1 kg/m). In 482 informative offspring, QTDT analyses demonstrated a significant association between BMI and the transmission of the ACE D allele (regression coefficient 0.563, chi 2 = 4.02, P = 0.04). In 106 families with at least one hypertensive offspring and at least one normotensive sibling, Sib-TDT analyses showed that the ACE D allele was slightly over-transmitted from heterozygous parents to hypertensive offspring (P = 0.08).


CONCLUSIONS
Our family-based study suggests that in Chinese, the ACE I/D polymorphism might play a role in the development of obesity and hypertension, which are closely linked cardiovascular risk factors.
Wang
Ji-Guang
JG
Ruijin Hospital, State Key Laboratory of Medical Genomics, Shanghai Institute of Hypertension, Shanghai Second Medical University, Shanghai, 200025, China.
He
Xin
X
Wang
Gu-Liang
GL
Li
Yan
Y
Zhou
Huai-Fa
HF
Zhang
Wei-Zhong
WZ
Zhan
Yi-Ming
YM
Zhu
Ding-Liang
DL
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D044466:Asian People / Q000235:genetics*; D001786:Blood Glucose; D001794:Blood Pressure; D015992:Body Mass Index; D003404:Creatinine / Q000097:blood; D005192:Family Health; D005260:Female; D017353:Gene Deletion; D020022:Genetic Predisposition to Disease / Q000453:epidemiology; D005838:Genotype; D006801:Humans; D006973:Hypertension / Q000208:ethnology* / Q000235:genetics*; D015810:Linkage Disequilibrium; D008055:Lipids / Q000097:blood; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009765:Obesity / Q000208:ethnology / Q000235:genetics; D007703:Peptidyl-Dipeptidase A / Q000235:genetics*; D011110:Polymorphism, Genetic; D012307:Risk Factors; D014527:Uric Acid / Q000097:blood
D001786:Blood Glucose; D008055:Lipids; D014527:Uric Acid; D003404:Creatinine; D007703:Peptidyl-Dipeptidase A