A founder haplotype on chromosome 2p for autosomal dominant Parkinson's disease (PD) has
been postulated for two families of Northern European descent, and a new mutation in the
α-synuclein gene (Ala30Pro) has been found in a German PD family. We evaluated 85 German PD
patients and 85 ethnically matched controls for shared markers on chromosome 2p and for the new
α-synuclein mutation. We found no evidence for linkage disequilibrium, suggesting that the putative
founder mutation on chromosome 2p is not a common cause of PD in the local population.
Furthermore, no patient carried the Ala30Pro change, supporting earlier findings that mutations in
the α-synuclein gene are extremely rare.