We have performed High resolution melting (HRM) mutation scanning of GATA4 coding exons of nonsyndrome 100 patients as a case group including 39 atrial septal defects (ASD), 57 ventricular septal defects (VSD) and four patients with both above defects and 50 healthy individuals as a control group.
However, subgroup analysis by types of CHD indicated that there was no significant association between GATA4 354 A>C mutation and the risk of ventricular septal defects.
Variants in the GATA4 gene have been implicated in several congenital heart diseases (CHD), such as the tetralogy of Fallot (ToF), atrial septal defect (ASD), ventricular septal defect (VSD), atrioventricular septal defect (AVSD), and dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM).
Genetic variants have been implicated, including CRELD1 mutations, but no previous study has examined the candidate genes, NKX2-5 and GATA4, in DS patients with secundum atrial defects (ASDII) and ventricular septal defects (VSD).
Fifteen heterozygous mutations in the GATA4 gene were identified in 30 congenital heart disease patients, including a novel heterozygous missense mutation (c.788 C>G) of GATA4 in one patient with ventricular septal defect.
These findings expand the mutation spectrum of GATA4 linked to VSD and provide new insight into the molecular etiology responsible for VSD, suggesting potential implications for the genetic diagnosis and gene-specific therapy for VSD.
In this study, the entire coding region of GATA4, a gene encoding a zinc finger transcription factor essential for normal cardiac morphogenesis, was sequenced in 160 unrelated patients with VSD.
We previously reported that a heterozygous G296S missense mutation of GATA4 caused atrial and ventricular septal defects and pulmonary valve stenosis in humans.
In this study, the whole coding region of the GATA4 gene, which encodes a zinc-finger transcription factor pivotal to cardiogenesis, was initially sequenced in 210 unrelated patients with VSD.
Almost all Gata4(+/-)Gata5(+/-) mutant embryos have double outlet right ventricles (DORV), large ventricular septal defects (VSD) as well as hypertrophied mitral and tricuspid valves.
The coding region of GATA4 and NKX2-5 genes was screened by sequencing in another 30 cases including 10 cases of ventricular septal defect (VSD), 10 cases of atrial septal defect (ASD), 8 cases of VSD combined with ASD and 2 cases of atrioventricular septal defects (AVSD).
Two heterozygous missense mutations of c.1220C > A and c.1273G > A in GATA4 gene, which cause the amino acid residue changes of P407Q and D425N in GATA4, were found in a patient with tetralogy of Fallot and a patient with ventricular septal defect, respectively.
Germ-line mutations in the zinc finger transcription factor GATA4 have been associated with familial cases of atrial and ventricular septal defects and pulmonary stenosis.