Abstract
BACKGROUND: Gastric cancer (GC) is a complex multifactorial disease. Previous studies have revealed genetic variations associated with the risk of gastric cancer. The purpose of the present study was to determine the correlation between single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of ZBTB20 and the risk of gastric cancer in Chinese Han population. METHODS: We conducted a 'case-control' study involving 509 GC patients and 507 healthy individuals. We selected four SNPs of ZBTB20 (10934270 T/C, rs9288999 G/A, rs9841504 G/C and rs73230612 C/T), and used logistic regression to analyze the relationship between those SNPs and GC risk under different genetic models; multi-factor dimensionality reduction (MDR) was used to analyze the interaction of "SNP-SNP" in gastric cancer risk; ANOVA and univariate analysis were used to analyze the differences in clinical characteristics among different genotypes. RESULTS: Our results showed that ZBTB20 rs9288999 is a protective factor for the risk of gastric cancer in multiple genetic models, of which the homozygous model is the most significant (OR = 0.48, P=0.0003); we also found that rs9288999 showed a significant correlation with reducing the risk of gastric cancer in different subgroups (BMI; age; gender; smoking or drinking status; adenocarcinoma); rs9841504 is associated with increased GC risk in the participants with BMI>24 kg/m2; rs9841504 and rs73230612 are certainly associated with clinical characteristics of platelet and carbohydrate antigen 242, respectively. CONCLUSION: Our results suggest that ZBTB20 rs9288999 may be important for reducing the risk of GC in the Chinese Han population.