Abstract
ASSOCIATION OF A MINISATALLEITE TANDEM REPEAT OF HUMAN TELOMERASE REVERSE TRANSCRIPTASE (HTERT MNS16A) AND ACUTE MYELOID LEUKAEMIA IN SUDANESE PATIENTS

Acute myeloid leukemia (AML), also known as acute myelogenous leukemia, is a cancer of the myeloid line of blood cells, characterized by the rapid growth of abnormal white blood cells that accumulate in the bone marrow and interfere with the production of normal blood cells. Telomerase reverse transcriptase TERT is a catalytic subunit of the enzymetelomerase, which, together with the telomerase RNA component (TERC), comprises the most important unit of the telomerase complex.Is responsible for catalyzing the addition of nucleotides in a TTAGGG sequence to the ends of a chromosome’s telomeres. The aim of this study was to detect the hTERT(MNS16A) variant among Sudanese patients with AML and to test the hypothesis that the MNS16Avariant is associated with risk of acute myeloid Leukemia among Sudanese patients. A total of 50 Sudanese patients with AML and50 healthy volunteers were enrolled in this study. DNA was extracted from k3 EDTA anti coagulated blood sample by salting out Extraction method for molecular analysis. Anallele specific PCR method was used simultaneously to amplify hTERT (MNS16A) variant in genomic DNA. Then the data were analyzed using the SPSS. A total of 50 patients attending the radio isotope center Khartoum, Sudan diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia. Their ages ranged between (3—70) years, 27 males (54%) and 23 females (46%), of them suffering from anemia about 27 (54%) of them with mild anemia, 12 (24%) of them with moderate anemia and 11 (22%) with severe anemia. hTERT (MNS16A) variant was found in 9 (18%) of studied patients. In summary we conclude that MNS16A variant (271\302) in the hTERT was significantly associated increased susceptibility to AML.