Lack of association between genetic polymorphisms in ROBO1, MRPL19/C2ORF3 and THEM2 with Developmental Dyslexia

Developmental Dyslexia (DD) is a heritable, complex genetic disorder characterized by specific impairment in reading and writing ability that is substantially below the expected reading ability given the person's chronological age, measured intelligence and age-appropriate education. More than ten susceptible genes have been identified for DD. A Single Nucleotide Polymorphism (SNP) of these genes was found to be associated with various phenotypes of DD. To identify the role of SNPs of four candidate genes namely, MRPL19/C2ORF3, ROBO1 and THEM2 in an Indian population, we genotyped eight SNPs of these genes in 157 children with DD and 212 normal readers using a MassARRAY technique with a MALDI-TOF MS analyzer. Power analysis of some of these SNPs showed > 80% of power. Chi-square test, Odds Ratios (ORs), 95% Confidence Intervals (CIs) and Bonferroni's correction were applied to identify the significance of the genotyped SNPs and haplotypes. Our study failed to show any association of SNPs and haplotypes of these genes with DD in an Indian population.