The tendency to recreate ancestral CG dinucleotides in the human genome.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The CG dinucleotides are known to be deficient in the human genome, due to a high mutation rate from 5-methylated CG to TG and its complementary pair CA. Meanwhile, many cellular functions rely on these CG dinucleotides, such as gene expression controlled by cytosine methylation status. Thus, CG dinucleotides that provide essential functional substrates should be retained in genomes. How these two conflicting processes regarding the fate of CG dinucleotides - i.e., high mutation rate destroying CG dinucleotides, vs. functional processes that require their preservation remains an unsolved question.

Results

By analyzing the mutation and frequency spectrum of newly derived alleles in the human genome, a tendency towards generating more CGs was observed, which was mai

SUBMITTER: Li M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3025853 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature