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Human Genome News Archive Edition

Human Genome Quarterly, Winter 1990; 1(3)

Workshops on Large Insert Cloning and Chromosome X

Researchers Meet in Consecutive Sessions
Consecutive sessions of the Large Insert Cloning Workshop and the X-Chromosome Workshop were held in Houston, Texas, on December 12-14 and December 14-16. The meetings were sponsored by DOE and NIH.

Large Insert Cloning Workshop: YAC Technology Progressing

Considerable progress was reported in the construction and analysis of yeast artificial chromosomes (YACs). Several groups are using YACs from the libraries prepared in the Washington University laboratories of David Schlessinger and Maynard Olson, and broader distribution of the libraries is planned. In the new technology of YAC construction/introduction, two reports illustrated that careful optimization of yeast permeability conditions is essential to achieve high transformation frequencies. Two systems described for introducing larger fragments for E. coli hosts are:

1. Packaging and delivery of 100-kb recombinant DNAs accomplished with a prophage/bacteriophage P1-based system. The linear DNAs are circularized and maintained as single-copy plasmids, whose amplification can be induced.
2. A similar bacteriophage T4-based packaging system that can deliver recombinant DNAs in the 200-kb range.

X-Chromosome Workshop: Physical and Genetic Mapping Technologies Applied

Methodologies discussed at the X-Chromosome Workshop illustrated the broad array of physical and genetic mapping techniques now being used to refine the knowledge of chromosome structure and function.

Included in the program were the following: genetic mapping through family studies, production of hybrids with chromosome fragments, cosmid mapping, YAC mapping, and DNA sequencing and microcloning (the polymerase chain reaction amplification and cloning of DNAs derived from particular mitotic chromosome bands).

Hans Lehrach (Imperial Cancer Research Fund Laboratory, United Kingdom) reported progress in methods employed for characterizing clones by oligonucleotide probing. This methodology will contribute to ordering a library with a sixfold cosmid coverage of chromosome X.

In addition to research results, participants in the workshops also discussed sharing genetic resources and information.

Reported by Marvin Stodolsky
DOE OHER Human Genome Program

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