Frequency of TP53 codon72 polymorphism in cases with colon cancer

Recent studies indicated that the Arg allele is preferentially mutated and retained in various human cancers arising in Pro/Arg heterozygotes and it may be an important biomarker in colon cancer prognosis. In this study, DNA was isolated from paraffine-embedded colon tumor tissue samples of 35 cases diagnosed as colon carcinoma. We have observed PCR-RFLP genotyping for the codon 72 exon 4 polymorphism (Arg72Pro) of the p53 gene. In this study, we detected that TP53 codon 72 polymorphism was present in 27 (77.1%) of 35 cases enrolled into the study. In 14 (51.9%) cases Arg/Arg, 11 (40.7%) cases Arg/Pro and 2 (7.4%) cases Pro/Pro genotype frequencies were found. In 8 (22.9%) cases DNA isolation were not obtained. Our results point out that individuals homozygous for the Arg allele have higher frequency than other alleles and that colon cancer may be related to Arg allele frequency. [Turk J Cancer 2009;39(1):5-10]