Association between birth weight, body mass index and IGF2/ ApaI polymorphism

Insulin-like growth factor II (IGF-II) is a polypeptide that plays a key role in mammalian growth, influencing fetal cell division, differentiation, and possibly metabolic regulation. In adult humans, polymorphisms of the IGF2 gene have been associated with predisposition to obesity. In the present study, we tested the association between IGF2/ ApaI genotype and Body Mass Index (BMI) in 294 healthy volunteers (95 men and 199 women; 18–30 y) and correlated the results with their birth weights (BW) in order to investigate the relationship between this polymorphic site, fetal life and adult BMI. Blood samples were obtained for DNA extraction, PCR and genotyping. The statistical analyses were performed by the Chi-square, Kolmogorov-Smirnov normality, and Tukey post hoc tests. Although the IGF2 genotype was not significantly associated with BMI and/or BW, we observed a statistically significant correlation of 0.33 ( p < 0.023) between BW and BMI in GG subjects whose BW was higher than 3.5 kg ( n = 47). We hypothesize that high BWs associated with homozygosis for the G allele of IGF2/ ApaI is not a null factor and might be associated with predisposition to high BMI in young adults.