Volume 5 • Issue 3 • 1000168 Mol Biol ISSN: 2168-9547 MBL, an open access journal Admas and Birhana, Mol Biol 2016, 5:3 DOI: 10.4172/2168-9547.1000168 Research Article Open Access The Frequency and Effects of CCR5 Delta 32 Allele in Gondar Population Adugnaw Admas 1 * and Nega Berhane 2 1 Ethiopian Environment and Forest Research Institute, Ethiopia 2 University of Gondar, Department of Biotechnology, Gondar Ethiopia Abstract HIV is the virus that causes AIDS. Its infection occurs by binding to CD4+ receptor and chemokine receptor 5 (CCR5). Recent studies have shown that reasons for progression and non-progression are multi factorial and may involve genetic, virological and immunological factors that infuence HIV disease progression in various ways. Chemokine receptors act as important co receptors mediating the entry of the human immunodefciency virus type 1 (HIV-1) into susceptible cells. The Δ32 mutation at the CCR5 locus is a well-studied example of natural selection acting in humans. Homozygous carriers of the Δ32 mutation are resistant to HIV-1. The aim of the present study was to assess the frequency of CCR5-Δ32 (Chemokine receptor delta 32 allele) in HIV-1 untreated individuals who visited Gondar university teaching hospital. 3 ml blood samples of ffty HIV-1 untreated seropositive individual and equal numbers of age and sex match seronegative individual who are exposed and uninfected were collected using EDTA coated vacutenous tubes. DNA from 1 ml blood samples was isolated using phenol-chloroform method. Specially designed primers, both forward and reverse was used to amplify the alleles of CCR5 using PCR (Polymerase chain reaction). Desirable data regarding study subjects were collected by using specifcally designed questioner. SPSS 16 and EPI-info version 3.2 were used to analyze the data. The frequency of the homozygous CCR5 mutant allele was zero in the study population and there was statistically no signifcance difference between the frequency of the heterozygous allele among cases and controls. There was no homozygous mutant allele both in cases and controls in the present study. This may be due to small sample size and thus another study on the same population with large sample size is warranted to further confrm the result. *Corresponding author: Adugnaw Admas, Ethiopian Environment and Forest Research Institute, Ethiopia, Tel: +251-918561763; E-mail: adu.biot@gmail.com Received June 24, 2016; Accepted July 07, 2016; Published July 14, 2016 Citation: Admas A, Berhane N (2016) The Frequency and Effects of CCR5 Delta 32 Allele in Gondar Population. Mol Biol 5: 168. doi:10.4172/2168-9547.1000168 Copyright: © 2016 Admas A, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Keywords: CCR5 Δ32; CD4; CXCR4; Disease progression; HIV-1 Introduction Background information HIV (Human Immunodefciency Virus) is the virus that causes AIDS. Tis virus may be passed from one person to another with infected blood, semen, or vaginal secretions come in contact with an uninfected person’s broken skin or mucous membranes. In addition, infected pregnant women can pass HIV to their baby during pregnancy or delivery, as well as through breast-feeding [1]. Acquired immunodefciency syndrome (AIDS) is a progressive deterioration of the immune status of the individual. It is characterized by the progressive depletion of the CD4 T lymphocyte, which represents a major target of viral infection by the causative human immunodefciency virus (HIV).Te continuing rise in the population of people living with HIV refects the combined efects of continued high rates of new HIV infections and the benefcial impact of antiretroviral therapy [2]. United Nations Joint Programme on HIV/AIDS indicated on the Global AIDS epidemic 2012 reports that despite variances between the rise and decline among infected people across the world, globally 34.0 million [31.4 million–35.9 million] people were living with HIV at the end of 2011. An estimated 0.8% of adults aged 15–49 years worldwide are living with HIV, although the burden of the epidemic continues to vary considerably between countries and regions. Sub-Saharan Africa remains most severely afected, with nearly 1 in every 20 adults (4.9%) living with HIV and accounting for 69% of the people living with HIV worldwide. Although the regional prevalence of HIV infection is nearly 25 times higher in sub-Saharan Africa than in Asia, almost 5 million people are living with HIV in South, South-East and East Asia combined. Afer sub-Saharan Africa, the region’s most heavily afected are the Caribbean and Eastern Europe and Central Asia, where 1.0% of adults were living with HIV in 2011 [3]. Te Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia joined UN Member States in June 2006 at the UN General Assembly to issue the Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS, which included a commitment to move towards the goal of universal access to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support by 2010. Since that commitment was made, Ethiopia has updated its planning framework with ambitious targets to achieve universal access, and it has launched a “Millennium AIDS Campaign that has catalyzed more rapid scale up of key prevention and treatment programs. Data obtained in 2005 from the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) indicate that the epidemic may be less severe, less generalized and more heterogeneous than previously believed. A careful assessment of data gathered over the last six years suggests that the epidemic has stabilized, with adult HIV prevalence estimated at 2.2% in 2003/04 and 2.1% in 2006/07. Te rural epidemic appears to be relatively widespread but heterogeneous, with most regions having a relatively low prevalence of HIV, but a few demonstrating adult prevalence greater than 5%. In general, HIV incidence is leveling of afer declining over the last few years (1996-2001) [4]. Country HIV prevalence estimates hinge on assumptions such as representativeness of surveillance systems. Until recently, Ethiopia had a national HIV prevalence estimate of 9.3% among persons aged 15–49 years and ranked third in terms of total persons infected. In 2002, this estimate has been adjusted to 6.4% [5]. M o l e c u l a r B io l o g y : O p e n A c c e s s ISSN: 2168-9547 Molecular Biology: Open Access