Recent studies showed that pseudogenes can regulate the expression of their coding gene partners by competing for miRNAs. The E2F family plays a crucial role in the control of cell cycle checkpoint. E2F3P1 is a pseudogene of E2F3. Few studies focused on genetic variations on pseudogenes. In this study, we performed a case-control study to assess the association between single nucleotide polymorphisms （SNPs） in E2F3P1 and hepatocellular carcinoma （HCC） risk in 1050 hepatitis B virus （HBV）-positive HCC cases and 1050 chronic HBV carders. Logistic regres- sion analysis was applied to estimate odds ratios （ORs） and 95% confidence intervals （CIs） for the associations between genotypes and HCC risk. We found that the variant CT/TT genotypes of rs1838149 were associated with a significantly decreased risk of HCC （adjusted OR = 0,66, 95% CIs = 0.51-0.86, P = 0.002） compared to those with wildtype CC homozygote. Furthermore, the AA genotype of rs9909601 had an increased HCC risk with an adjusted OR of 1.41 （95% CIs = 1.07-1.86）, and the A allele of rs9909601 was significantly associated with HCC risk com- pared to those with the G allele （adjusted OR = 1.17, 95% CIs = 1.03-1.33, P = 0.017）. These results indicate that genetic variations in the pseudogene E2F3P1 may confer HCC risk.
Li LiuYao LiuJibin LiuXiangjun ZhaiJuan WenKaipeng XieHongbing ShenZhibin HuZhining Fan
