Conflict of interest statement

Results of case-control and prospective studies in associations with the IL-6 (cid:2)174 G/C promoter region polymorphism and successful aging have been very conflicting. While some authors found that individuals carrying IL-6 (cid:2)174 G allele were more frequent among very old people (Christiansen et al., 2004) or in the survivor group among nonagenarians (Hurme et al., 2005); others found a significant association between the (cid:2)174 G allele and decreased human longevity (Bonafe` et al., 2001). On the other hand, according to the results of some studies, there was no statistically significant association determined between the IL-6 polymorphism and aging (Capurso et al., 2004; Pes et al., 2004; Reiner et al., 2005; Di Bona et al., 2009).

None.

Acknowledgement

This study is partly supported by The Scientific and Technical Council of Turkey (TUBITAK; Project No: 109S248, 2010)

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Nevertheless, a great amount of studies reported a positive association between the IL-6 (cid:2)174 G/C polymorphism and longevity, and the capability of producing low levels of IL-6 throughout life span appears to be beneficial for longevity (Bonafe` et al., 2001; Christiansen et al., 2004; Franceschi et al., 2005;