FCGR3B gene frequencies among ethnic Thai blood donors from a regional hospital in Eastern Thailand.

The FCGR3B gene encodes three human neutrophil antigens which consist of HNA-1a, HNA-1b, and HNA-1c. These antigens are encoded by three alleles in the FCGR3B locus: FCGR3B*01, FCGR3B*02, and FCGR3B*03 alleles, respectively. The frequencies of FCGR3B alleles have been reported in different ethnic populations. This study compared the FCGR3B gene frequencies among 230 unrelated healthy Eastern Thai blood donors in Rayong hospital with the previously published studies. The polymerase chain reaction-sequence-specific primers method was performed to determine FCGR3B genotypes. The results showed that the allele frequencies of FCGR3B*01, FCGR3B*02, and FCGR3B*03 were 0.722, 0.274, and 0.009, respectively. The FCGR3B*01 and FCGR3B*02 frequencies found in the Eastern Thais were similar to the previous reports investigating in Northern Thais, Chinese Han, Taiwanese, and Japanese populations. Interestingly, our data showed statistically significant difference ( P < 0.05) to Central Thais, Korean, Indian, Turkish, Australian, Tunisian, American, German, and Italian populations. In addition, one FCGR3Bnull, which represents a gene deletion, was also found in this study. This information is important not only for the assessment of neutrophil antibody-mediated clinical conditions and for disease association studies but also for anthropological studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]