HLA class I allele lineages and haplotype frequencies in Arabs of the United Arab Emirates

Abstract

The high degree of polymorphism of the HLA system provides suitable genetic markers to study the diversity and migration of different world populations and is beneficial for forensic identification, anthropology, transplantation and disease associations. Although the United Arab Emirates (UAE) population of about nine million people is heterogeneous, information is limited for the HLA class I allele and haplotype frequencies of the Bedouin ethnic group. We performed low‐resolution PCR‐SSP genotyping of three HLA class I loci at HLA‐A, ‐B and ‐C for 95 unrelated healthy Bedouins from the cities of Al Ain and Abu Dhabi in the UAE. A total of 54 HLA allele lineages were detected; the most frequent low‐resolution allele lineages at each HLA locus were A*02 (0.268), B*51 (0.163) and C*07 (0.216). The inferred estimates for the two most frequent HLA‐A and HLA‐B haplotypes were HLA‐A*02 ~ HLA‐B*50 (0.070) and HLA‐A*02 ~ HLA‐B*51 (0.051), and the most frequent 3‐locus haplotype was HLA‐A*02 ~ HLA‐B*50 ~ HLA‐C*06 (0.068). The HLA allele lineage frequencies of the UAE Arabs were compared to those previously reported for 70 other world populations, and a strong genetic similarity was detected between the UAE Arabs and the Saudi Arabians from the west with evidence of a limited gene flow between the UAE Arabs and Pakistani across the Gulf from the east, and the UAE Arabs and Omani from the south of the Gulf Peninsula.

MHC class I polymorphic Alu insertion (POALIN) allele and haplotype frequencies in the Arabs of the United Arab Emirates and other world populations

“…While the Japanese, north‐eastern Thai and several other Asian populations appear to share similar allele frequency distributions, a distinctly lower frequency of Alu insertions in the African sub‐Saharan subpopulations has given rise to a sparser topology on the phylogenetic tree (Figure ). The results from this study of Arabs from the United Arab Emirates are in accordance with the hypothesis that early humans originated in Africa, the Out of Africa hypothesis (Antunez‐de‐Mayolo et al, ), with the Middle East having acted as a crossroads from which populations then migrated east to Asia and to the north‐west to Europe (Kulski et al, ).…”

“…The percentage association and linkage disequilibrium (LD) values between the Alu insertions and HLA allelic lineages as two‐locus haplotypes in UAE Arabs were determined using the HLA allele lineages (Kulski et al, ) and the Alu allelic data reported here for the same samples. Supporting Information Table shows the alleles frequencies for HLA‐A, HLA ‐B and HLA ‐C and their percentage association with the 5 MHC class I POALIN frequencies in UAE Arab population.…”

“…The HLA class I allele lineages were genotyped by PCR-SSP methods following the protocol described by Abdrabou, Witzel, Paduch, Tay, and Alsafar (2016), and the results (Supporting Information Table S1) were reported previously by Kulski, Alsafar, Mawart, Henschel, and Tay (2019). Genotyping was performed at the low field one resolution level because of the available methods in the laboratory at this time.…”

“…Because the HWE deviations for HLA-A and HLA-B were significant, this might be a confounding factor for the frequency estimates of all class I region markers. However, the HLA class I onefield allele lineage frequencies at the HLA-A and HLA-B loci in our UAE population sample were compared to 70 other world populations and a strong genetic similarity was detected between the UAE Arabs and the Saudi Arabians from the west with evidence of a limited gene flow between the UAE Arabs and Pakistani across the Gulf TA B L E 1 Frequency of observed genotypes, frequency analysis, Hardy-Weinberg significance test and fixation index estimates for AluHF, AluHG, AluHJ, AluTF and AluMICB in 95 UAE Arabs using GENEPOP analysis from the east, and the UAE Arabs and Omani from the south of the Gulf Peninsula (Kulski et al, 2019).…”

“…There is also an AluOR POALIN in the olfactory receptor (OR) gene region 325.8 kb telomeric of the HLA-F locus that was shown to significantly differentiate between the Japanese, Australian European and African American populations (Kulski, Shigenari, & Inoko, 2014). These class II and OR-POALINs Asia and to the north-west to Europe (Kulski et al, 2019). , and the lowest frequency (0.162) was in the Interior Mongolians of Mongolia (Tian et al, 2008).…”