Project description:Uniparental disomy (UPD), in which an individual contains a pair of homologous chromosomes originating from only one parent, is a frequent phenomenon that is linked to congenital disorders and various cancers. UPD is thought to result mostly from pre- or post-zygotic chromosome missegregation. However, the factors that drive UPD remain unknown. Here we use the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe as a model to investigate UPD, and show that defects in the RNA interference (RNAi) machinery or in the YTH domain-containing RNA elimination factor Mmi1 cause high levels of UPD in vegetative diploid cells. This phenomenon is not due to defects in heterochromatin assembly at centromeres. Notably, in cells lacking RNAi components or Mmi1, UPD is associated with the untimely expression of gametogenic genes. Deletion of the upregulated gene encoding the meiotic cohesin Rec8 or the cyclin Crs1 suppresses UPD in both RNAi and mmi1 mutants. Moreover, overexpression of Rec8 is sufficient to trigger UPD in wild-type cells. Rec8 expressed in vegetative cells localizes to chromosomal arms and to the centromere core, where it is required for localization of the cohesin subunit Psc3. The centromeric localization of Rec8 and Psc3 promotes UPD by uniquely affecting chromosome segregation, causing a reductional segregation of one homologue. Together, these findings establish the untimely vegetative expression of gametogenic genes as a causative factor of UPD, and provide a solid foundation for understanding this phenomenon, which is linked to diverse human diseases.
Project description:We report gene expression profiling in the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe. We performed high-throughput sequencing of RNA isolated from wild-type, ago1d, mmi1d and dcr1d strains.
Project description:Occupancy profiling of lysine 9 dimethylated histone H3 in fission yeast. Occupancy profiling of Psc3, Rec8, Rad21 and Rec11 proteins in fission yeast.
Project description:Robertsonian translocations (ROBs) are whole arm rearrangements involving the acrocentric chromosomes 13-15 and 21-22 and carriers are at increased risk for aneuploidy and thus uniparental disomy (UPD). Chromosomes 14 and 15 are imprinted with expression of genes dependent on the parental origin of the chromosome. Correction of a trisomic or monosomic conceptus for chromosomes 14 or 15 would lead to one of the established UPD 14mat/pat or UPD 15 (Prader-Willi/Angelman) syndromes (PWS/AS). In view of this, prenatal UPD testing should be considered for balanced carriers of a ROB, fetuses with a familial or de novo balanced ROB that contains chromosome 14 or 15 or with a normal karyotype when a parent is a carrier of a balanced ROB with a 14 or 15. Individuals with congenital anomalies and an abnormal phenotype and carry a ROB involving the two imprinted chromosomes should also be UPD tested.
Project description:Uniparental disomy (UPD) is often considered as an event to be characterized exclusively by molecular genetic or epigenetic approaches. This review shows that at least one third of UPD cases emerge in connection with or due to a chromosomal rearrangement. Thus, additional (molecular) cytogenetic characterization of UPD cases is essential. Up to now > 1,100 UPD cases detected in clinical, non-tumor cases are reported in the literature. Recently, these cases were summarized in a regularly updated, freely available online database http://www.med.uni-jena.de/fish/sSMC/00START-UPD.htm. Based of this, here the presently known imprinting syndromes, the chromosomal contribution to UPD phenomenon, and the cytogenetic subgroups of UPD, including cases with normal, abnormal balanced or unbalanced karyotype (like e.g. small supernumerary marker chromosomes and Robertsonian translocations) and segmental UPD are reviewed. Furthermore, chromosome fragmentation as a possible mechanism of trisomic rescue is discussed, which might help to explain the observed 1:9 rate of maternal versus paternal UPD present in cases with original trisomic karyotypes. Overall, as UPD is more but an interesting rarity, the genetic background of each "UPD-patient" needs to be characterized besides by molecular methods, also by molecular cytogenetics in detail.
Project description:In the diploid cells of most organisms, including humans, each chromosome is usually distinguishable from its partner homolog by multiple single-nucleotide polymorphisms. One common type of genetic alteration observed in tumor cells is uniparental disomy (UPD), in which a pair of homologous chromosomes are derived from a single parent, resulting in loss of heterozygosity for all single-nucleotide polymorphisms while maintaining diploidy. Somatic UPD events are usually explained as reflecting two consecutive nondisjunction events. Here we report a previously undescribed mode of chromosome segregation in Saccharomyces cerevisiae in which one cell division produces daughter cells with reciprocal UPD for the same pair of chromosomes without an aneuploid intermediate. One pair of sister chromatids is segregated into one daughter cell and the other pair is segregated into the other daughter cell, mimicking a meiotic chromosome segregation pattern. We term this process "reciprocal uniparental disomy."