This Article Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Copyright Information Books from ASM Press MicrobeWorld Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Lowenhaupt, K Articles by Pardue, M L Search for Related Content PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by Lowenhaupt, K Articles by Pardue, M L

Nonrandom distribution of long mono- and dinucleotide repeats in Drosophila chromosomes: correlations with dosage compensation, heterochromatin, and recombination.

Department of Biology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge 02139.

ABSTRACT

Long stretches of (dC-dA)n.(dT-dG)n, abbreviated CA/TG, have a distinctive distribution on Drosophila chromosomes (M.L. Pardue, K. Lowenhaupt, A. Rich, and A. Nordheim, EMBO J. 6:1781-1789, 1987). The distribution of CA/TG suggests a correlation with the overall transcriptional activity of chromosomal regions and with the ability to undergo meiotic recombination. These correlations are conserved among Drosophila species and may indicate one or more chromosomal functions. To test the generality of these findings, we analyzed the distribution of the rest of the six possible mono- and dinucleotide repeats (A/T, C/G, AT/AT, CA/TG, CT/AG, and CG/CG). All but CG/CG were present at significant levels in the genomes of the six Drosophila species studied; however, A/T levels were an order of magnitude lower than those of the other sequences. Data base analyses suggested that the same sequences are present in other eucaryotes. Like CA/TG, both CT/AG and C/G showed increased levels on dosage-compensating chromosomes; however, the individual sites clearly differed for each sequence. In contrast, A/T and AT/AT, although present in Drosophila DNA, could not be detected in situ in polytene chromosomes. We also used in situ hybridization to analyze the neo-Y chromosome of Drosophila miranda, an ancestral autosome that has become attached to the Y chromosome and is now partially heterochromatic. The neo-Y has acquired repeated DNA sequences; we found that the added sequences are as devoid of mono- and dinucleotide repeats as other heterochromatin. The distribution and function of these sequences are likely to result from both their repetitious nature and base contents.

This article has been cited by other articles:

• McNeil, J. A., Smith, K. P., Hall, L. L., Lawrence, J. B. (2006). Word frequency analysis reveals enrichment of dinucleotide repeats on the human X chromosome and [GATA]n in the X escape region. Genome Res. 16: 477-484 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Gilfillan, G. D., Straub, T., de Wit, E., Greil, F., Lamm, R., van Steensel, B., Becker, P. B. (2006). Chromosome-wide gene-specific targeting of the Drosophila dosage compensation complex. Genes Dev. 20: 858-870 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Casacuberta, E., Pardue, M.-L. (2002). Coevolution of the Telomeric Retrotransposons Across Drosophila Species. Genetics 161: 1113-1124 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Gonzalez, J., Ranz, J. M., Ruiz, A. (2002). Chromosomal Elements Evolve at Different Rates in the Drosophila Genome. Genetics 161: 1137-1154 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Locke, J., Podemski, L., Aippersbach, N., Kemp, H., Hodgetts, R. (2000). A Physical Map of the Polytenized Region (101EF-102F) of Chromosome 4 in Drosophila melanogaster. Genetics 155: 1175-1183 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Bull, L. N., Pabón-Peña, C. R., Freimer, N. B. (1999). Compound Microsatellite Repeats: Practical and Theoretical Features. Genome Res. 9: 830-838 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Bailey, A. D., Pavelitz, T., Weiner, A. M. (1998). The Microsatellite Sequence (CT)n · (GA)n Promotes Stable Chromosomal Integration of Large Tandem Arrays of Functional Human U2 Small Nuclear RNA Genes. Mol. Cell. Biol. 18: 2262-2271 [Abstract] [Full Text]