Affiliations 

  • 1 Pharmacogenomics Laboratory, Department of Pharmacology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya, Lembah Pantai, 59100, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
  • 2 Pharmacogenomics Laboratory, Department of Pharmacology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya, Lembah Pantai, 59100, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. batoolsadat@yahoo.com
  • 3 School of Pharmacy, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong, China. lwbaum@hotmail.com
  • 4 Department of Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
  • 5 Division of Neurology, General Hospital Kuala Lumpur, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
  • 6 Division of Neurology, Department of Medicine and Therapeutics, Prince of Wales Hospital, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong, China
  • 7 Department of Psychiatry, The University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam, Hong Kong, China
  • 8 Department of Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Mol Neurobiol, 2016 07;53(5):2869-2877.
PMID: 25876511 DOI: 10.1007/s12035-015-9150-1

Abstract

Epilepsy is a common neurological disease characterized by recurrent unprovoked seizures. Evidence suggested that abnormal activity of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) contributes to the pathogenesis of epilepsy. Some previous studies identified association between genetic variants of BDNF and risk of epilepsy. In this study, this association has been examined in the Hong Kong and Malaysian epilepsy cohorts. Genomic DNA of 6047 subjects (1640 patients with epilepsy and 4407 healthy individuals) was genotyped for rs6265, rs11030104, rs7103411, and rs7127507 polymorphisms by using Sequenom MassArray and Illumina HumanHap 610-Quad or 550-Duo BeadChip arrays techniques. Results showed significant association between rs6265 T, rs7103411 C, and rs7127507 T and cryptgenic epilepsy risk (p = 0.00003, p = 0.0002, and p = 0.002, respectively) or between rs6265 and rs7103411 and symptomatic epilepsy risk in Malaysian Indians (TT vs. CC, p = 0.004 and T vs. C, p = 0.0002, respectively) as well as between rs6265 T and risk of cryptogenic epilepsy in Malaysian Chinese (p = 0.005). The Trs6265-Crs7103411-Trs7127507 was significantly associated with cryptogenic epilepsy in Malaysian Indians (p = 0.00005). In conclusion, our results suggest that BDNF polymorphisms might contribute to the risk of epilepsy in Malaysian Indians and Chinese.

* Title and MeSH Headings from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.