Abstract
Major depressive disorder is a common chronic emotional disorder, and cyclic adenosine monophosphate response element binding protein 1 (CREB1) is hypothesized to play a role in its pathogenesis. The aim of the present study was to investigate the associations between major depressive disorder and relevant single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the CREB1 gene. A total of 1,038 subjects of Han Chinese descent were recruited, including 456 patients with major depressive disorder (case group) and 582 healthy volunteers (control group). The frequency distributions of the genotypes and alleles were estimated in the case and control groups, and analyzed for any correlation with major depressive disorder. Three relevant SNP sites in CREB1 were analyzed using quantitative polymerase chain reaction, and statistical analyses were performed to estimate their use as risk factors for major depressive disorder. The analyses revealed that rs2254137 and rs16839883 in CREB1 showed polymorphisms in the sample population, and the genotype and allele frequencies of rs16839883 differed significantly when comparing the patients and healthy controls (P<0.05). No statistically significant differences were detected in the two SNP sites between the male and female patients (P>0.05). Furthermore, no statistically significant differences were detected in rs2254137 genotype and allele distribution when comparing the male and female patients with their corresponding control groups (P>0.05). However, statistically significant differences were observed in the genotype and allele frequencies of rs16839883 when the male and female patients were compared with their respective controls (P<0.05). Therefore, the results demonstrated that there is a close correlation between the rs16839883 polymorphism in CREB1 and major depressive disorder, which suggests that this SNP site should be further studied as a potential biomarker for major depressive disorder.