The DNaseI hypersensitive sites (HSs) of the human β-globin locus control region (LCR) may function as part of an LCR holocomplex within a larger active chromatin hub (ACH). Differential activation of the globin genes during development may be controlled in part by preferential interaction of each gene with specific individual HSs during globin gene switching, a change in conformation of the LC...

High-level beta-globin gene expression is dependent on the presence of the locus control region (LCR), a powerful regulatory element physically characterized by five DNase I-hypersensitive sites (HS), designated HS1-HS5. Of these, HS3 contains seven GT motifs that are essential for its activity. One of the motifs, GT6, has been shown by in vivo footprinting to display the largest difference in ...

Sickle cell disease is characterized by a very heterogeneous clinical course among patients with the same mutations for sickle hemoglobin (HbS). anemia (SCA) hereditary hemoglobinopathy caused homozygosity of point mutation in beta-globin gene, which leads to substitution glutamic acid valine sixth position.

Regulated expression of the human beta-globin gene has been demonstrated in cultured murine erythroleukemia cells and in mice after retrovirus-mediated gene transfer. However, the low titer of recombinant viruses described to date results in relatively inefficient gene transfer, which limits their usefulness for animal studies and for potential gene therapy in humans for diseases involving defe...

An American black woman was found to have the phenotype of moderately severe a-thalassemia normally associated with the loss of two to three a-globin genes despite an a-gl9bin gene map that demonstrated the loss of only a single a-globin gene (-a/ aa). Several individuals in her kindred with normal a-globin gene mapping studies (aa/aa) had mild a-thalassemia hematologic values consistent with t...

To examine whether transfer of gamma globin genes into mouse erythroleukemia cells can be used for the analysis of regulatory elements of gamma globin gene promoter, Agamma gene constructs carrying promoter truncations that have been previously analyzed in transgenic mice were used for production of stably transfected mouse erythroleukemia (MEL) cell clones and pools. We found that constructs, ...

For more than 30 years it was believed that globin gene domains included only genes encoding globin chains. Here we show that in chickens, the domain of alpha-globin genes also harbor the non-globin gene TMEM8. It was relocated to the vicinity of the alpha-globin cluster due to inversion of an approximately 170-kb genomic fragment. Although in humans TMEM8 is preferentially expressed in resting...

DNA sequence-specific binding proteins eluted from chicken erythrocyte and thymus nuclei, and fractionated as described by Emerson and Felsenfeld (19), have been investigated by filter binding and footprint analyses. The erythrocyte nuclear protein fraction specifically binds to at least two sites within the 5' flanking chromatin hypersensitive site of the chicken beta A-globin gene, and to a s...

Lemur P-related globin genes have been isolated and sequenced. Orthology of pro-simian and human E-, y-, and P-related globin genes was established by dot-matrix analysis. All of these lemur globin genes potentially encode functional P-related globin polypeptides, though precisely when the y-globin gene is expressed remains unknown. The organization of the 18-kb brown lemur P-globin gene cluste...