Neuroreport
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Mu opioid receptor (MOR) has been shown to be associated with alcoholism and opioid dependence. The present study examined the involvement of a polymorphism in A118G in exon 1 and C1031G in intron 2 of the MOR gene in 200 Chinese heroin-dependent and 97 control subjects. ⋯ The G allele is more common in the heroin-dependent group (39.5% and 30.8% for A118G and C1031G polymorphisms, respectively) when compared to the controls (29.4% and 21.1% for A118G and C1031G polymorphisms, respectively). This study suggests that the variant G allele of both A118G and C1031G polymorphisms may contribute to the vulnerability to heroin dependence.