VAX1 gene associated non-syndromic cleft lip with or without palate in Western Han Chinese

Objective: Non-syndromic cleft lip with or without palate (NSCL/P) is one of the most common human birth defects, it results from multiple genetic and environmental risk factors. Recently, GWA studies identified associations between NSCL/P and two genetic risk loci, rs7078160 and rs4752028, at VAX1. Design: Currently, we tried to investigate the roles of the two loci among 302 NSCL/P trios (129 non-syndromic cleft lip only (NSCLO) trios and 173 non-syndromic cleft lip and cleft palate (NSCLP) trios) from Western Han Chinese. The two SNPs were genotyped by SNPscan method; Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium test, allelic TDT and parent-of-origin effect were performed by PLINK software, and genotypic TDT and haplotype by FBAT software. Results: Allelic TDT analysis revealed allele A at rs7078160 was over-transmitted among NSCL/P group (P = 0.0086, ORtransmission 1.36, 95%CI: 1.08-1.72). Parent-of-origin effect analysis revealed a paternal special over-transmission of allele A at rs708260 in NSCL/P group (P = 0.0079). Haplotype AC of rs7078160-rs4752028 was significant over-transmitted in the NSCL/P group. Conclusions: Our study firstly confirmed that allele A at rs7078160 at VAX1 gene was a risk factor for NSCL/P in Western Han Chinese population.