War without weapons: constitution of healthy and pathological phenotypes associated with polymorphisms in genes involved in the maintenance of genome integrity

Capacity to repair DNA damage may vary significantly between individuals coming out as healthy on routine physical and laboratory examinations. This variance does not generally cause distress or disease unless in case that specific triggers are present, but, taken together with other factors, may increase the risk for certain types of cancer or may modulate the outcome of anticancer therapies. Carriership of certain polymorphic variants in DNA repair genes may also modify the course of the normal process of aging. The present paper reviews the role of some of the common polymorphisms in DNA repair genes and in genes involved in the maintenance of genomic integrity; and their association, separately or in combination, with the ‘healthy’ phenotype and with certain diseases and conditions related to exposure to increased levels of oxidative damage.