Association between Genetic Variants and Obesity in Iranian Population: Review Article

Obesity is currently considered as a serious global health problem which is influenced by environmental and genetic factors. Association of genetic variants with obesity is widely scrutinized in recent years. The aim of this study was to evaluate present data on genetics of obesity in Iranian population in a systematic review study. To obtain all related studies, Google Scholar, PubMed, and Persian web databases; IranMedex and Magiran were searched up to January 2013. The search terms were; "gene", "polymorphism, "obesity", "waist circumference", "BMI" affiliated to Iran. Non-population cross sectional studies, experimental studies, in vitro studies, case reports, review articles, letters to editor, short communications and dissertations were excluded. Finally 11 articles that investigated association of different gene variants with obesity were included. Due to the heterogeneity of data, it was impossible to perform a Meta-analysis. Our study showed that males with TT genotype for +45T>G variant of adiponectin gene, GG genotype for -11391G>A polymorphism of adiponectin, GC+GG genotype for Pro12Ala PPAR gamma 2 gene variant, 1484insG carriers of PTP1B and AA genotype of 4223A>C ADA gene variant had significant positive association with obesity in Iranian population. However gene variants of glucokinase, TNF-alpha, UCP2, MTHFR, beta 3-adrenoreceptor and apolipoprotein E were not significantly associated with obesity. There are discrepancies in association between obesity and genetic variants in Iranian population compared to other populations. Therefore we suggest large scale genome wide association studies on defined populations with distinct clinical features are necessary in future to further investigate underlying genetic variants associated with obesity in Iranian population.