Publication Date:
1993-08-27
Description:
In adult animals, template-independent (or N) nucleotides are frequently added during the rearrangement of variable (V), diversity (D), and joining (J) segments of lymphocyte receptor genes, greatly enhancing junctional diversity. Receptor genes from adult mice carrying a mutation in the terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase (TdT) gene have few N nucleotides, providing proof that this enzyme is essential for creating diversity. Unlike those from normal adults, receptor genes from adult mutant mice show extensive evidence of homology-directed recombination, suggesting that TdT blocks this process. Thus, switch-on of the TdT gene during the first week after birth provokes an even greater expansion of lymphocyte receptor diversity than had previously been thought.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉Gilfillan, S -- Dierich, A -- Lemeur, M -- Benoist, C -- Mathis, D -- New York, N.Y. -- Science. 1993 Aug 27;261(5125):1175-8.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉Laboratoire de Genetique Moleculaire des Eucaryotes du CNRS, Institut de Chimie Biologique, Strasbourg, France.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8356452" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉
Keywords:
Animals
;
Base Sequence
;
DNA Nucleotidylexotransferase/genetics/*metabolism
;
Gene Rearrangement, B-Lymphocyte
;
Gene Rearrangement, T-Lymphocyte
;
*Genes, Immunoglobulin
;
Immunoglobulin Joining Region/genetics
;
Immunoglobulin Variable Region/genetics
;
Lymphocytes/*immunology
;
Mice
;
Mice, Inbred C57BL
;
Molecular Sequence Data
;
Mutation
;
Nucleotides/*metabolism
;
Receptors, Antigen, T-Cell/*genetics
;
Recombination, Genetic
Print ISSN:
0036-8075
Electronic ISSN:
1095-9203
Topics:
Biology
,
Chemistry and Pharmacology
,
Computer Science
,
Medicine
,
Natural Sciences in General
,
Physics
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