LOCALIZATION OF 8 ADDITIONAL GENES IN THE HUMAN MAJOR HISTOCOMPATIBILITY COMPLEX, INCLUDING THE GENE ENCODING THE CASEIN KINASE-II BETA-SUBUNIT (CSNK2B)

A wide range of antoimmune and other diseases are known to be associat ed with. tile major histocompatibility complex. Many of these diseases are linked to the genes encoding the polymorphic histocompatibility a ntigens in the class I and class II regions, but some appear to be mor e strongly associated with genes in the central 1100-kb class III regi on, making it important to characterize this region fully for the pres ence of novel genes. An similar to 220-kb, segment of DNA in the class III region separating tile Hsp70 (HSPA1L) and BAT1 (D6S8IE) genes, wh ich was previously known to contain 14 genes, has been analyzed for th e presence of additional genes. Genomic DNA fragments spanning the gap s between the known genes were used as probes to isolate cDNAs corresp onding to five new genes within this region. Evidence from Northern Mo t analysis and exon trapping experiments that suggested the presence o f at least two more new genes was also obtained. Partial cDNA and comp lete exonic genomic sequencing of one of the new genes has identified it as the casein kinase II beta subunit (CSNK2B). Two of the other nov el genes lie within a region syntenic to that implicated in susceptibi lity to experimental allergic orchitis in the mouse, an autoimmune dis ease of the testis, acid represent additional candidates for the Orch- 1 locus associated with this disease. In addition, characterization of the 13-kb intergenic gap separating the RD (D6545) and G11 (D6S60E) g enes has revealed the presence of a gene encoding a 1246-amino-acid po lypeptide that shows significant sequence similarity to the yeast anti -viral Ski2p gene product. (C) 1996 Academic Press, Inc.