Background: Periodontitis is a multifactorial disease and its severe forms, such as aggressive periodontitis, are suggested to have a genetic basis. Among the genetic factors, polymorphisms in cytokine genes have recently been described in susceptibility to periodontitis. IL-10 is a multi-functional cytokine thought to play a role in the pathogenesis of periodontitis. A substitution G/A polymorphism in the promoter region of the IL-10 gene at position –1082 has been associated with different amounts of IL-10 production. The aim of the present study was to investigate the possible links between –1082(G/A) polymorphism of the IL-10 gene and the generalized form of aggressive periodontitis.
Material/Methods: This study included 52 Iranian Khorasanian (north-east province of Iran) subjects suffering from generalized aggressive periodontitis referred to the Periodontology Department of Mashhad Dental School. They were compared to 61 age and sex-matched healthy controls of the same race. DNA was isolated from peripheral blood cells and genotyping was performed by means of the amplification refractory mutation system polymerase chain reaction (ARMS-PCR) method. Data were analyzed using the chi-squared test.
Results: There was no marked difference in genotype frequencies between the controls and generalized aggressive periodontitis patients (p=0.585). Moreover, no association between patients and normal subjects was found in their allele frequency (p=0.329).
Conclusions: We conclude that the polymorphic nucleotide A at position –1082 of the IL-10 gene is not associated with generalized aggressive periodontitis in the Iranian population.

Keywords: Adolescent, Alleles, Base Sequence, Case-Control Studies, DNA Primers - genetics, Gene Frequency, Interleukin-10 - genetics, Iran, Periodontitis - immunology, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide