A Rapid Method of Genomic Array Analysis of Scaffold/Matrix Attachment Regions (S/MARs) Identifies a 2.5-Mb Region of Enhanced Scaffold/Matrix Attachment at a Human Neocentromere

  1. Huseyin Sumer,
  2. Jeffrey M. Craig,
  3. Mandy Sibson, and
  4. K.H. Andy Choo1
  1. Murdoch Childrens Research Institute, Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne, Victoria 3052, Australia

Abstract

Human neocentromeres are fully functional centromeres that arise at previously noncentromeric regions of the genome. We have tested a rapid procedure of genomic array analysis of chromosome scaffold/matrix attachment regions (S/MARs), involving the isolation of S/MAR DNA and hybridization of this DNA to a genomic BAC/PAC array. Using this procedure, we have defined a 2.5-Mb domain of S/MAR-enriched chromatin that fully encompasses a previously mapped centromere protein-A (CENP-A)-associated domain at a human neocentromere. We have independently verified this procedure using a previously established fluorescence in situ hybridization method on salt-treated metaphase chromosomes. In silico sequence analysis of the S/MAR-enriched and surrounding regions has revealed no outstanding sequence-related predisposition. This study defines the S/MAR-enriched domain of a higher eukaryotic centromere and provides a method that has broad application for the mapping of S/MAR attachment sites over large genomic regions or throughout a genome.

Footnotes

  • [Supplemental material is available online at www.genome.org.]

  • Article and publication are at http://www.genome.org/cgi/doi/10.1101/gr.1095903.

  • 1 Corresponding author. E-MAIL choo{at}cryptic.rch.unimelb.edu.au; FAX 61-3-9348-1391.

    • Accepted April 18, 2003.
    • Received December 12, 2002.
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