RESUMO
Genomic DNA of 178 German Caucasian patients with systemic lupus erythematosus are studied for HLA-DP locus by using PCR and DIG-ddUTP-labelled oligonucleotide probes. A significant increase of DPB1*0101 is observed in SLE patients compared with healthy controls (chi 2 = 15.27, p.c. < 0.004). DPB1*0501 and *0901 are also slightly increased (chi 2 = 5.85, P < 0.05, p.c. = NS; chi 2 = 5.64, P < 0.05, p.c. = NS). There is no significant difference in frequency of DP alleles between male and female patients. Since a linkage disequilibrium between HLA-B, DR and DP loci is found in our SLE patients, an analysis is performed assessing the relative importance of these HLA-markers to SLE. The results show that the increase of DPB1*0101 in SLE patients is associated with the HLA-B8, DR3 haplotype and it suggests a more important role for HLA-B8, DR3 or genes within this haplotype than for DPB1*0101 in the genetic predisposition for SLE.