Background: Hereditary hemorrhagic telangiectasia (HHT) is an autosomal dominant vascular disorder, affecting 1:5000 individuals worldwide. All the genes associated to the disease (ENG, ACVRL1, SMAD4, GDF2) belong to the TGF-β/BMPs signaling pathway. We found 19 HHT unrelated families, coming from a Northern Italy region and sharing the ACVRL1 in-frame deletion c.289_294del (p.H97_N98). Methods: To test the hypothesis of a founder effect, we analyzed 88 subjects from 19 families (66 variant carriers, showing clinical signs of HHT, and 22 non-carriers, unaffected) using eight microsatellite markers within 3.7 Mb around the ACVRL1 locus. After the haplotype reconstruction, age estimation of the variant was carried out. Results: We observed a common disease haplotype in 16/19 families, while three families showed evidence of recombination around the ACVRL1 locus. The subsequent age estimation analyses suggested that the mutation occurred about 8 generations ago, corresponding to about 200 years ago. We also present novel in silico and modeling data supporting the variant pathogenicity: the deletion alters the protein stability and removes the unique extracellular glycosylation site. Conclusion: We have demonstrated, for the first time, a “founder effect” for a HHT pathogenic variant in Italy.

Hereditary hemorrhagic telangiectasia: First demonstration of a founder effect in Italy; the ACVRL1 c.289_294del variant originated in the country of Bergamo 200 years ago

Sbalchiero A.;Abu Hweij Y.;Scotti C.;Pagella F.;Matti E.;Olivieri C.
2022-01-01

Abstract

Background: Hereditary hemorrhagic telangiectasia (HHT) is an autosomal dominant vascular disorder, affecting 1:5000 individuals worldwide. All the genes associated to the disease (ENG, ACVRL1, SMAD4, GDF2) belong to the TGF-β/BMPs signaling pathway. We found 19 HHT unrelated families, coming from a Northern Italy region and sharing the ACVRL1 in-frame deletion c.289_294del (p.H97_N98). Methods: To test the hypothesis of a founder effect, we analyzed 88 subjects from 19 families (66 variant carriers, showing clinical signs of HHT, and 22 non-carriers, unaffected) using eight microsatellite markers within 3.7 Mb around the ACVRL1 locus. After the haplotype reconstruction, age estimation of the variant was carried out. Results: We observed a common disease haplotype in 16/19 families, while three families showed evidence of recombination around the ACVRL1 locus. The subsequent age estimation analyses suggested that the mutation occurred about 8 generations ago, corresponding to about 200 years ago. We also present novel in silico and modeling data supporting the variant pathogenicity: the deletion alters the protein stability and removes the unique extracellular glycosylation site. Conclusion: We have demonstrated, for the first time, a “founder effect” for a HHT pathogenic variant in Italy.
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11571/1455723
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