CHROMOSOME SIGNPOSTS FOR GENE MAPPING

THE LONG-TERM GOAL IS TO CLONE A SET OF DNA MARKERS SPACED EVERY 5 CENTIMORGANS ALONG THE HUMAN GENOME. TO ACHIEVE THIS GOAL, A NOVEL APPROACH HAS BEEN DEVISED TO GENERATE A SET OF NATURALLY SPACED CHROMOSOMAL SIGNPOSTS. THESE SIGNPOSTS WILL ALLOW RAPID CHROMOSOME ASSIGNMENT AND REGIONAL LOCALIZATION OF UNMAPPED SEQUENCES AND GENES. FUTHERMORE, IT IS BELIEVED THAT THIS STRATEGY WILL FACILITATE ORDERED HUMAN GENOME SEQUENCING. IN PHASE I, SIGNPOSTS WILL BE GENERATED FOR HUMAN CHROMOSOME 16 CLONING A SUBSET OF HPA II A TINY FRAGMENT (HTF) ISLANDS. THE RESULTING PROBES WILL DEFINE A NEW AND EXISTING CHROMOSOME16 PROBES AND ALLOW FOR REFINEMENT OF THECURRENT CHROMOSOME 16 MAP. THESE MARKERS MAY PROVE USEFUL FOR THE DIAGNOSIS OF ADULT POLYCYSTIC KIDNEY DISEASE (APKD) IF SUCCESSFUL, THIS WILL BE THE METHOD OF CHOICE TO EXTEND THE CURRENT REPERTOIRE OF DNA MARKERS.