Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation/Wellcome Trust DiabetesInflammation Laboratory, Cambridge Institute for Medical Research, University of Cambridge, WT/MRC building, Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, CB2 2XY, UK. sergey.nejentsev@cimr.cam.ac.uk
Vitamin D is known to modulate the immune system, and its administration has been associated with reduced risk of type 1 diabetes. Vitamin D acts via its receptor (VDR). Four single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of the VDR gene have been commonly studied, and evidence of association with type 1 diabetes has been reported previously. We sequenced the VDR gene region and developed its SNP map. Here we analyzed association of the 98 VDR SNPs in up to 3,763 type 1 diabetic families. First, we genotyped all 98 SNPs in a minimum of 458 U.K. families with two affected offspring. We further tested eight SNPs, including four SNPs associated with P