Investigation of the urotensin-II gene Thr21Met ve Ser89Asn polymorphisms in migraine

Migraine is a common neurovascular brain disorder with heterogeneous clinical presentation, including recurrent headache attacks and hypersensitivity of various functional systems of the nervous system. The molecular mechanisms and genetics of migraine have not yet been fully clarified. The objective of this study was to analyze the genotype distributions and allele frequencies for urotensin-II gene (UTS2) Thr21Met and Ser89Asn polymorphisms among the migraine patients. A total of 146 patients with migraine were genotyped for the Thr21Met and Ser89Asn polymorphisms and compared with 154 age and sex-matched healthy controls. The detection of UTS2 gene polymorphisms was achieved with polymerase chain reaction (PCR) - restriction fragment-length polymorphism (RFLP) analysis technique. Neither genotype distributions nor the allele frequencies for the Thr21Met and Ser89Asn polymorphisms showed a significant difference between the groups. Additionally, there were no marked differences in genotype distribution or allele frequencies for the migraine without aura and migraine with aura subgroups when compared to control group. This is the first study to show that the UTS2 gene Thr21Met and Ser89Asn polymorphisms are not risk factors for the migraine in the Turkish population.