SOD1 Gene +35A/C (exon3/intron3) Polymorphism in Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus among South Indian Population.

Superoxide dismutase is an antioxidant enzyme that is involved in defence mechanisms against oxidative stress. Cu/Zn SOD is a variant that is located in exon3/intron3 boundary. The aim of the present study was to investigate whether the Cu/Zn SOD (+35A/C) gene polymorphism is associated with the susceptibility to type 2 diabetes mellitus among south Indian population. The study included patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (n = 100) and healthy controls (n = 75). DNA was isolated from the blood and genotyping of Cu/Zn SOD gene polymorphism was done by polymerase chain reaction based restriction fragment length polymorphism method. Occurrence of different genotypes and normal (A) and mutant (C) allele frequencies were determined. The frequency of the three genotypes of the total subjects was as follows: homozygous wild-type A/A (95%), heterozygous genotype A/C (3%), and homozygous mutant C/C (2%). The mutant (C) allele and the mutant genotypes (AC/CC) were found to be completely absent among the patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus. Absence of mutant genotype (CC) shows that the Cu/Zn SOD gene polymorphism may not be associated with the susceptibility to type 2 diabetes mellitus among south Indian population.