Abstract:
Leber hereditary optic neuropathy (LHON) is the most common mitochondrial
DNA (mtDNA) disorder, characteristically presented with maternally inherited, acute
or subacute, bilateral, painless loss of central vision due to optic nerve atrophy, and
typically in healthy young adult males. The G11778A primary LHON mutation in the
mtDNA, affecting the ND4 subunit of respiratory complex I, is the most common
causal mutation of LHON worldwide as well as in Thailand. However, carrying the
mutation does not guarantee expression of the disease. This incomplete penetrance,
the male preponderance, and the optic nerve-specific disease expression, cannot be
explained solely by the mitochondrial inheritance. Additional genetic and/or
environmental factors are required for the disease expression. This thesis aimed to
characterize pedigree and mitochondrial genetic features and their correlation to the
disease expression of multiple G11778A LHON pedigrees in Thailand, and to search
for nuclear genetic factor(s) modulating the expression of the G11778A mutation
using a total genome scan and linkage analysis. The analyses of G11778A LHON
pedigrees in Thailand showed some characteristics different from those in the
literature. The most remarkable point was the higher prevalence of pedigrees with
G11778A blood heteroplasmy (32% in Thai pedigrees compared with 15% in the
literature). The estimated disease penetrance was 38% for males and 13% for females.
Affected mothers were more likely to have affected offspring than were unaffected
mothers (p=0.04). It was found that gender, G11778A heteroplasmy, and the
secondary LHON mutations, G3316A and C3497T, each significantly influenced the
disease penetrance. However, they appeared not to affect the final visual acuities in
affected people or influence the age of onset, except for the secondary mutations,
which seemed to have a synergistic deleterious effect with the G11778A mutation,
accelerating the onset of the disease in our patients (p=0.036). From the total genome
scan and affected-only allele sharing nonparametric linkage analysis, 6 interesting
chromosomal regions with Zlr>2 (p<0.025), potentially harbouring nuclear modifier
gene(s), were identified. These regions were around microsatellite markers D1S207,
D3S1565, D12S352, D13S1265, D18S68, and DXS1227. The regions around the
markers D3S1565 and D12S352 were fascinating since they are located close to the
nuclear subunit genes of respiratory complex I, NDUFB5 and NDUFA9, respectively.