Evaluation of IL12B as a candidate type I diabetes susceptibility gene using data from the Type I Diabetes Genetics Consortium

As part of its efforts to identify genes affecting the risk of type I diabetes (T1D), the Type I Diabetes Genetics Consortium commissioned an extensive survey of variants associated with genes reported earlier to have an association with disease susceptibility. In this report, we present the analysis of a set of single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) within and flanking the IL12B gene, which encodes the p40 subunit of the cytokines interleukin (IL)-12 and IL-23. No SNP showed individually significant association in the population as a whole. Nevertheless, subjects stratified according to genotype at the earlier reported SNP in the IL12B 3′UTR, rs3212227, confirmed small, but significant, differences in age of disease onset with a relative hazard=0.88 (P=0.005). The protective effect of rs3212227 allele 2 was gender specific (P=0.004 overall and P=0.0003 when unaffected siblings were considered). Among females, the 2.2 genotype was more protective, with relative hazard=0.75. We conclude that while there was no major effect of IL12B polymorphisms on T1D susceptibility in the entire study group, they have an impact on a subset of at-risk individuals.