A common genetic variant is associated with risk for follicular lymphoma (FL), according to a study published online in this week's Nature Genetics.

Lymphomas are cancers that arise in immune system cells, and are classified into two different types: Hodgkin and non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL). The risk of developing NHL increases with age, and about 1 out of 4 cases of NHL is follicular lymphoma. The overall survival rate of FL varies widely, but about 20% of cases die early in the course of the disease.

In this study, Christine Skibola and colleagues analyzed the genomes of thousands of individuals with NHL. They report that a genetic variant on chromosome 6p21 is significantly associated with FL.