The Effect of Type 1 Diabetes Protection and Susceptibility Associated HLA Class II Genotypes on DNA Methylation in Immune Cells

Researchers examined genome-wide DNA methylation by microarrays to cover over 850,000 CpG sites in the CD4+ T cells and CD19+ B cells of healthy subjects homozygous either for DRB1*15-DQA1*01-DQB1*06:02, associated with a strongly decreased type 1 diabetes (T1D) risk, DRB1*03-DQA1*05-DQB1*02, or DRB1*04:01-DQA1*03-DQB1*03:02, associated with a moderately increased T1D risk.