“…The major ABO alleles in the Japanese population are A101, A102, A201, B101, O01, and O02. Among the 13 SNPs residing in exons 6‐7 of the ABO gene, the three SNPs at positions 261, 526, and 803 are enough to identify the A, B, and O alleles which occur frequently in the Japanese population . The droplet‐AS‐PCR method described here was specific for single nucleotide alterations, and utilized primers with a mismatched nucleotide located between the −3 to −1 positions relative to the 3′ terminus of the primer, a feature that was shown to provide high specificity for amplification from the desired templates.…”