Association of IL12B risk haplotype and lack of interaction with HLA-Cw6 among the psoriasis patients in India

Psoriasis is a complex multifactorial chronic inflammatory skin disorder involving both genetic and environmental susceptibility factors. It is strongly associated with HLA-Cw6, but several studies suggested that further genetic factors may confer additional risk. We investigated the association of two single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), rs3212227 at the 3'-untranslated region and rs7709212 located at ~6.7 kb upstream from the transcription start site of IL12B gene in a case-control study comprising 1702 individuals from India. We found both SNPs were significantly associated with psoriasis (rs7709212: odds ratio (OR)=1.37, P-value=1.09 × 10 ; rs3212227: OR=1.38, P-value=8.88 × 10 ). IL12B gene was significantly upregulated in involved skin of psoriasis patients with risk genotype carriers (rs7709212_TT and rs3212227_TT) compared with non-risk genotype carriers (rs7709212_CC and rs3212227_GG). Significantly higher serum protein concentration of IL12 was also observed among risk allele carriers compared with non-risk allele carriers irrespective of the presence of HLA-Cw6 allele. Haplotype analysis suggested significant increased risk (OR=1.50, P-value=5.01 × 10 ) to the disease when both risk alleles of IL12B were present. IL12 serum protein concentration of risk haplotype (TT-TT) carriers showed significant upregulation compared with the non-risk carriers independent of HLA-Cw6 alleles. Our data suggested the association of IL12B with the psoriasis, however no evidence was observed for the epistatic effect of IL12B with HLA-Cw6 among the psoriasis patients in India.