FIG. 2.

SNPs at the IFNL3 locus associated with HCV infections. (A) IFNL3 locus at 19q13 has 4 genes. IFNL3 codes for IFN-λ3, IFNL2 codes for IFN-λ2, and IFNL1 codes for IFN-λ1 apart from the newly identified IFNL4 (codes for IFN-λ4) that arises due to a deletion polymorphism (ss469415590) found upstream of IFNL3 coding region. The important SNPs at the IFNL3 locus identified by several genetic studies are shown. The SNPs rs4803219, rs28416813, rs8103142, and rs4803217 were identified as causal SNPs by di Lulio and others (2011). The SNPs identified by Smith and others (2011) are in italics. The TA repeat SNP identified by Sugiyama and others (2011) is underlined. rs12979860 and rs8099917 are considered the “tag-SNPs” (in bold) that are in LD with the causal SNPs. (B) The protective and nonprotective alleles of the SNPs that were identified by different studies are shown as haplotypes. (C) Crystal structure of IFN-λ3 depicting K70 (dark shade) (PDBID: 3HHCL). The variant rs8103142 changes the amino acid K70 to R70. K70 is exposed on the outside surface of the protein.