title: Telomere length, genetic variants and gastric cancer risk in a Chinese population.
abstract: Telomeres maintain chromosomal stability and integrity and are crucial in carcinogenesis. Telomere length is implicated in multiple cancer risk, but the results are conflicting. Genome-wide association studies have identified several genetic loci associated with telomere length in Caucasians. However, the roles of telomere length and related variants on gastric cancer development are largely unknown. We conducted a case-control study including 1136 gastric cancer cases and 1012 controls to evaluate the associations between telomere length, eight telomere length-related variants identified in Caucasians and gastric cancer risk in Chinese population. We observed an obvious U-shaped association between telomere length and gastric cancer risk (P < 0.001), with odds ratios (95% confidence intervals) being 3.81 (2.82-5.13), 1.65 (1.21-2.26), 1.28 (0.93-1.77) and 1.78 (1.30-2.44) for individuals in the first (the shortest), second, third and fifth (the longest) quintile as compared with those in the fourth quintile as reference group. The weighted genetic score (WGS) of eight variants was significantly associated with telomere length (P < 0.001), and in particular, the G allele of rs2736100 in TERT at 5p15.33 exhibited a significant association with long telomeres (P = 0.047). However, we did not observe significant associations between these genetic variants and gastric cancer risk for both single-variant and WGS analyses. These findings suggest that either short or extreme long telomeres may be risk factor for gastric cancer. Genetic variants identified in Caucasians may also contribute to the variation of telomere length in Chinese but seems not to gastric cancer susceptibility.
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and Jiangsu Key Lab of Cancer Biomarkers, Prevention and Treatment, Collaborative Innovation Center For Cancer Personalized Medicine, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China, Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Molecular and Translational Cancer Research, Collaborative Innovation Center For Cancer Personalized Medicine, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 210009, China.
authors.forename: Jiangbo
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Du
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and.
authors.forename: Xun
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Zhu
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and.
authors.forename: Cuiwei
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Xie
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and Jiangsu Key Lab of Cancer Biomarkers, Prevention and Treatment, Collaborative Innovation Center For Cancer Personalized Medicine, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China.
authors.forename: Ningbin
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Dai
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and Jiangsu Key Lab of Cancer Biomarkers, Prevention and Treatment, Collaborative Innovation Center For Cancer Personalized Medicine, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China.
authors.forename: Yayun
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Gu
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and Jiangsu Key Lab of Cancer Biomarkers, Prevention and Treatment, Collaborative Innovation Center For Cancer Personalized Medicine, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China.
authors.forename: Meng
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Zhu
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and Jiangsu Key Lab of Cancer Biomarkers, Prevention and Treatment, Collaborative Innovation Center For Cancer Personalized Medicine, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China.
authors.forename: Cheng
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical Oncology, The Affiliated Huaian First People's Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Huaian 223300, China.
authors.forename: Yong
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Gao
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical Oncology, The Affiliated Huaian First People's Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Huaian 223300, China.
authors.forename: Feng
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Pan
authors.affiliation: Medical Lab, Northern Jiangsu People's Hospital, Yangzhou 225001, China and.
authors.forename: Chuanli
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Ren
authors.affiliation: Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery, The Affiliated Wuxi People's Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Wuxi 214043, China.
authors.forename: Yong
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Ji
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and Jiangsu Key Lab of Cancer Biomarkers, Prevention and Treatment, Collaborative Innovation Center For Cancer Personalized Medicine, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China.
authors.forename: Juncheng
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Dai
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and.
authors.forename: Hongxia
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Ma
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and.
authors.forename: Yue
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Jiang
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and Jiangsu Key Lab of Cancer Biomarkers, Prevention and Treatment, Collaborative Innovation Center For Cancer Personalized Medicine, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China.
authors.forename: Jiaping
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and.
authors.forename: Honggang
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Yi
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and.
authors.forename: Yang
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and Jiangsu Key Lab of Cancer Biomarkers, Prevention and Treatment, Collaborative Innovation Center For Cancer Personalized Medicine, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China, Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Molecular and Translational Cancer Research, Collaborative Innovation Center For Cancer Personalized Medicine, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 210009, China.
authors.forename: Zhibin
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Hu
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and Jiangsu Key Lab of Cancer Biomarkers, Prevention and Treatment, Collaborative Innovation Center For Cancer Personalized Medicine, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China, guangfujin@njmu.edu hbshen@njmu.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Hongbing
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Shen
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health and Jiangsu Key Lab of Cancer Biomarkers, Prevention and Treatment, Collaborative Innovation Center For Cancer Personalized Medicine, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China, Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Molecular and Translational Cancer Research, Collaborative Innovation Center For Cancer Personalized Medicine, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 210009, China, guangfujin@njmu.edu.
authors.forename: Guangfu
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Jin
mesh_terms: D016022:Case-Control Studies; D002681:China; D005260:Female; D020022:Genetic Predisposition to Disease; D014644:Genetic Variation / Q000235:genetics; D055106:Genome-Wide Association Study; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012306:Risk; D013274:Stomach Neoplasms / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000235:genetics*; D019098:Telomerase / Q000235:genetics; D016615:Telomere / Q000235:genetics; D059505:Telomere Homeostasis / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: C509186:TERT protein, human; D019098:Telomerase