Investigation of Toll-Like Receptor-2 (2258G/A) and Interferon Gamma (+874T/A) Gene Polymorphisms among Infertile Women with Female Genital Tuberculosis

BACKGROUND: Toll-like receptor 2 (TLR2) and interferon-gamma (IFN-γ) coordinate with a diverse array of cellular programs through the transcriptional regulation of immunologically relevant genes and play an important role in immune system, reproductive physiology and basic pathology. Alterations in the functions of TLR2 2258G (guanine)/ A, IFN-γ (+874T/A) and signalling molecules that result from polymorphisms are often associated with susceptibility or resistance, which may, in turn, establish the innate host response to various infectious diseases. Presently, we proposed to investigate the risk of common single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) of TLR2 and IFN-γ genes, for their effect on infertility in women with female genital tuberculosis (FGTB) and healthy women as controls. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Genotyping of TLR2 and IFN-γ gene polymorphisms was performed by amplification refractory mutation system multi-gene/multi-primer polymerase chain reaction followed by restriction fragment length polymorphism in 175 FGTB patients and 100 healthy control women (HCW). The TLR2 polymorphism [adenine (A) allele] was observed in 57.7 and 58.0% of FGTB patients and HCW, respectively. The IFN-γ (+874T/A) polymorphism (A allele) was significant in 74.3 and 71.0% of FGTB patients and HCW, respectively, while the odds ratios for the AA and TA genotypes for predisposition of FGTB were found to be 0.304 and 1.650 in HCW, respectively. The SNP of TLR2 was not associated with FGTB but the SNP of IFN-γ was found to be associated with mycobacteria infections and to induce infertility. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: At present, we hypothesize that infertile women with FGTB and HCW without tuberculosis (TB) have identical frequency of TLR variants, which may be adequate in the production of IFN-γ in response to Mycobacterium tuberculosis infections. Thus, the study appears to be the first of its kind reporting a mutation in the IFN-γ gene [+874 T (thymine) to A] responsible for susceptibility to TB infections and further inducing infertility.