Journal Article

Functional Reintroduction of Human Telomeres into Mammalian Cells

Goodfellow, Peter, Cooke, Howard, Fantes, Judith, Farr, Christine

1991

Overview

Telomeric sequences of eukaryotes consist of short tandem repeats organized in arrays of variable length in which the guanine-rich strand runs 5'→ 3' toward the chromosomal end. The terminal repeats in yeast are the only elements necessary for telomere function in this organism. To test whether mammalian terminal repeats can function after reintroduction into a mammalian cell, a repeat-containing terminal fragment from a human chromosome was electroporated into a hamster-human hybrid cell line. In 6 of 27 independent transformants analyzed, the introduced sequences were found at the ends of chromosomes, based on all available criteria. Terminal restriction-fragment heterogeneity and the survival of these chromosomes demonstrate that these telomeres are functional. Cytogenetic evidence from one of these cell lines suggests that chromosome breakage with healing at the integration site is the mechanism responsible for the terminal location

• Publisher: National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America,National Acad Sciences
• Subject: Animals / Base Sequence / Biological and medical sciences / Cell Line / Cell lines / Chromatin. Chromosome / Chromosomes / Chromosomes, Human - physiology / Cloning, Molecular / Cricetinae / Cricetulus / DNA / DNA - genetics / DNA - isolation & purification / Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology / Genetic Techniques / Genetic vectors / Humans / Hybrid Cells - cytology / Karyotyping / Male / Molecular and cellular biology / Molecular genetics / Molecular Sequence Data / Oligonucleotide Probes / Plasmids / Repetitive Sequences, Nucleic Acid / Restriction Mapping / Somatic cells / Telomeres / Terminal repeat sequences / transformation / Transformed cell line / X Chromosome / Y Chromosome / Yeasts