Monocyte chemoattractant protein 1 (MCP-1) gene polymorphism is not associated with severe and cerebral malaria in Thailand.

The pathogenesis of cerebral malaria from Plasmodium falciparum infection is thought to involve inflammation of the central nervous system. Since monocyte chemoattractant protein 1 (MCP-1) is a chemokine strongly involved in the inflammatory process, we here study MCP-1 gene polymorphisms in association with severe or cerebral malaria in Thailand. Malaria patients in the northwest of Thailand were grouped into mild (n=206), severe (165), and cerebral (110) malaria case groups. Five single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the promoter (-2518A/G, -2348G/C, -2158C/T, -2076A/T, and -2072T/C), and 1 SNP in intron 1 (764C/G) were analyzed by PCR-RFLP, PCR-SSP, or direct sequencing. The SNP -2158 was a novel polymorphism found in this study. For all SNPs, genotype and allele frequencies were not significantly different between mild and severe or mild and cerebral malaria. Strong linkage disequilibrium was found among 4 SNPs (-2518A/G, -2348G/C, -2076A/T, and 764C/G), resulting in 4 major estimated haplotypes. The most common haplotype was GGAC. The results indicated that MCP-1 gene polymorphisms were not associated with malaria severity, implying that MCP-1 was not a cause of malaria severity in this Thai population.