Human Biology Open Access Pre-Prints

Document Type

Article

Anticipated Volume

94

Anticipated Issue

4

Abstract

Interferon-induced Transmembrane Protein 3 (IFITM3) plays a substantial role in the immune system by repressing viral entry into host cells and restricting virus replication. Recent research suggests that IFITM3/rs34481144 and IFITM3/rs12252 contribute to susceptibility to viral infections across populations dependent on their population frequencies, which needs further clarification. Here, we conducted a population-based study to determine the prevalence of two regulator SNPs in the Turkish population and evaluated genotype and allele frequencies in individuals stratified into groups based on a pilot survey conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Tetra-Primer Arms PCR (TPA-PCR) assays and Sanger sequencing methods were used for genotyping rs34481144 and rs12252, and all participants (n=200) participated in a questionnaire consisting of items related to individual experiences during COVID-19 pandemic. Distributions of genotype frequencies and pairwise linkage disequilibrium (LD) correlations were calculated and compared to publicly available data from worldwide populations. The frequency of minor alleles of rs12252-G and rs34481144-T were found to be 0.128 and 0.324, respectively, in the total sample. Our preliminary data obtained from a self-reported survey gave no concrete evidence for the correlation of the analyzed SNPs with COVID-19 severity or vaccine side effects yet pinpointed a trend for an association of rs12252-G with symptom burdens which requires further investigation. Overall, our results present genotype and allele distributions of two IFITM3 polymorphisms in the Turkish population and provide present preliminary data on the previously propounded correlations of the genotypes with COVID-19 in our population.

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