HLA genes in Amerindians from Mexico San Vicente Tancuayalab Teenek/Huastecos.

ABSTRACT

Huastecos or Teenek Amerindians are presently living at North East Mexico (San Luis Potosi State). They have probably one of the most ancient culture of Mexico and Central America together with Mayas and Olmec groups with which also show close relationships. Proximity to Atlantic Ocean/Mexican Gulf originated that Spaniards had very early contact with them at about 1519 CE or before. In the present paper we have aimed to study HLA gene profile which may be useful for HLA and disease epidemiology and transplant programs in Teeneks. HLA-DRB1*0407, -DRB1*1406 and -DRB1*0411 have been found in high frequency like in other Amerindian groups. High frequency typical Amerindians HLA extended haplotypes have been found, such as A*02-B*35-DRB1*0407-DQB1*0302; A*68-B*39-DRB1*0407-DQB1*0302 and A*02-B*39-DRB1*0407-DQB1*0302; also new haplotypes have been described, like A*02-B*52-DRB1*0411-DQB1*0302, A*68-B*35-DRB1*1402-DQB1*0301 and A*68-B*40-DRB1*1602-DQB1*0301. Genetic proximity is observed not only to linguistically close Mayans, but also to Mazatecans, Mixtecans and Zapotecans, who speak an altogether different languages; it shows once more that genes and languages do not correlate. This population was greatly diminished after European contact between 1500 and 1600 years CE; in fact, North and South America First Inhabitants population was brought from 80 down to 8 million people because of diseases (i.e. measles, smallpox or influenza), slavery and war.