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Nat Genet. 1993 Jan;3(1):3-4.
Isolation of a partial candidate gene for Menkes disease by positional cloning.
Mercer JF,
Livingston J,
Hall B,
Paynter JA,
Begy C,
Chandrasekharappa S,
Lockhart P,
Grimes A,
Bhave M,
Siemieniak D, et al.
Department of Pediatrics, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Menkes disease is an X-linked recessive disorder of copper metabolism resulting in death in early infancy. The gene has been mapped to band Xq13 based, in part, on a translocation breakpoint in a female with the disease, which was found to lie within 300 kilobases (kb) of the PGK-1 locus, allowing the isolation of a YAC clone spanning the breakpoint. Phage subclones from the breakpoint region were isolated and used to screen cDNA libraries. cDNA clones were found which detect an 8 kb transcript from normal individuals but show diminished or absent hybridization in Menkes disease patients. Partial sequence of the cDNA shows a unique open reading frame containing putative metal binding motifs which have been found in heavy metal resistance genes in bacteria. This gene is a strong candidate for the Menkes disease gene.
PMID: 8490647 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]