Developing an Approach for Using Low Quantities of DNA for HLA typing: A Tool for Determining the Ancestral Link of Disease

Molecular genetic research relies on determining the underlying biology of health disparity populations; however, biospecimen donations from these populations are scarce. Factors that contribute to limited biospecimen donation include lack of time, trust and transparency. In fact, often small quantities of biospecimen and/or DNA are available. Therefore, we sought to develop a new approach for using small quantities of DNA to study genetic links between individuals burdened by health disparities. These links can be uncovered by human leukocyte antigen (HLA) typing. Unfortunately, this method requires micrograms of DNA when often only nanograms of DNA are available from health disparity populations. Consequently, we developed a method for amplifying low quantities of genomic DNA for use in HLA typing. Preliminary results suggest that the amplified DNA yields the same HLA types as genomic DNA thus validating our approach. In future work, this approach can be used to study the genetic link between individuals afflicted with a particular health disparity. For example, the high incidence of triple‐negative breast cancer for African American women in the U.S. and for Ghanian women world‐wide suggests an ancestral link for this disease that can be uncovered by HLA typing.