Investigation of glutathione S-transferase zeta and the development of sporadic breast cancer

Robert A Smith, Joanne E Curran, Stephen R Weinstein, Lyn R Griffiths

Certain genes from the glutathione S-transferase superfamily have been associated with several cancer types. It was the objective of this study to determine whether alleles of the glutathione S-transferase zeta 1 (GSTZ1) gene are associated with the development of sporadic breast cancer. DNA samples obtained from a Caucasian population affected by breast cancer and a control population, matched for age and ethnicity, were genotyped for a polymorphism of the GSTZ1 gene. After PCR, alleles were identified by restriction enzyme digestion and results analysed by chi-square and CLUMP analysis. Chi-squared analysis gave a chi2 value of 4.77 (three degrees of freedom) with P = 0.19, and CLUMP analysis gave a T1 value of 9.02 with P = 0.45 for genotype frequencies and a T1 value of 4.77 with P = 0.19 for allele frequencies. Statistical analysis indicates that there is no association of the GSTZ1 variant and hence the gene does not appear to play a significant role in the development of sporadic breast cancer.