Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2014 May 6;9(5):e94683.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0094683. eCollection 2014.

Genetic polymorphisms of the glycine N-methyltransferase and prostate cancer risk in the health professionals follow-up study

Marcelo Chen  1 , Yi-Ling Huang  2 , Yu-Chuen Huang  3 , Irene M Shui  4 , Edward Giovannucci  5 , Yen-Ching Chen  6 , Yi-Ming Arthur Chen  7
Affiliations

Genetic polymorphisms of the glycine N-methyltransferase and prostate cancer risk in the health professionals follow-up study

Marcelo Chen et al. PLoS One. .

Abstract

Purpose: Glycine N-methyltransferase (GNMT) affects genetic stability by regulating the ratio of S-adenosylmethionine to S-adenosylhomocysteine, by binding to folate, and by interacting with environmental carcinogens. In Taiwanese men, GNMT was found to be a tumor susceptibility gene for prostate cancer. However, the association of GNMT with prostate cancer risk in other ethnicities has not been studied. It was recently reported that sarcosine, which is regulated by GNMT, increased markedly in metastatic prostate cancer. We hereby explored the association of GNMT polymorphisms with prostate cancer risk in individuals of European descent from the Health Professionals Follow-up Study (HPFS).

Methods: A total of 661 incident prostate cancer cases and 656 controls were identified from HPFS. The GNMT short tandem repeat polymorphism 1 (STRP1), 4-bp insertion/deletion polymorphisms (INS/DEL) and the single nucleotide polymorphism rs10948059 were genotyped to test for their association with prostate cancer risk.

Results: The rs10948059 T/T genotype was associated with a 1.62-fold increase in prostate cancer risk (95% confidence interval (CI): 1.18, 2.22) when compared with the C/C genotype. The STRP1 ≥ 16GAs/≥ 16GAs genotype was associated with decreased risk of prostate cancer when compared with the < 16GAs/< 16GAs genotype (odds ratio (OR) = 0.68; 95% CI: 0.46, 1.01). INS/DEL was not associated with prostate cancer risk. Haplotypes containing the rs10948059 T allele were significantly associated with increased prostate cancer risk.

Conclusion: In men of European descent, the GNMT rs10948059 and STRP1 were associated with prostate cancer risk. Compared to the study conducted in Taiwanese men, the susceptibility GNMT alleles for prostate cancer had a reverse relationship. This study highlights the differences in allelic frequencies and prostate cancer susceptibility in different ethnicities.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Yeo EJ, Wagner C (1994) Tissue distribution of glycine N-methyltransferase, a major folate-binding protein of liver. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 91: 210–214. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Kerr SJ (1972) Competing methyltransferase systems. J Biol Chem 247: 4248–4252. - PubMed
    1. Chen SY, Lin JR, Darbha R, Lin P, Liu TY, et al. (2004) Glycine N-methyltransferase tumor susceptibility gene in the benzo(a)pyrene-detoxification pathway. Cancer Res 64: 3617–3623. - PubMed
    1. Lee CM, Chen SY, Lee YC, Huang CY, Chen YM (2006) Benzo[a]pyrene and glycine N-methyltransferse interactions: gene expression profiles of the liver detoxification pathway. Toxicol Appl Pharmacol 214: 126–135. - PubMed
    1. Yen CH, Hung JH, Ueng YF, Liu SP, Chen SY, et al. (2009) Glycine N-methyltransferase affects the metabolism of aflatoxin B1 and blocks its carcinogenic effect. Toxicol Appl Pharmacol 235: 296–304. - PubMed

Publication types

Substances