N. Tommerup et al., A ZINC-FINGER GENE ZNF141 MAPPING AT 4P16.3 D4S90 IS A CANDIDATE GENEFOR THE WOLF-HIRSCHHORN (4P-) SYNDROME/, Human molecular genetics, 2(10), 1993, pp. 1571-1575
Chromosomal aneusomy is a major cause of reproductive wastage and cong
enital malformations in man. Zinc finger encoding genes would be good
candidates for being involved in the multiple developmental defects as
sociated with chromosomal aneusomy-by virtue of their role as transcri
ptional regulators, their abundancy in the genome and their known asso
ciation with specific developmental disorders. We have isolated and ma
pped a zinc finger encoding cDNA (ZNF141) of the C2-H-2/KRAB subfamily
to the 4p - (Wolf - Hirschhorn) syndrome (WHS) chromosome region. ZNF
141 mapped to the distal end of the 2.2 Mb smallest region of deletion
overlap of WHS, 300 kb from the 4p telomere on cosmid CD1 defining th
e anonymous locus D4S90. ZNF141 was expressed ubiquitously at low leve
ls in the analysed tissue. The identification of a candidate gene for
a chromosomal aneusomy syndrome belonging to a class of evolutionary c
onserved genes will provide options for studying its normal and abnorm
al expression during mammalian embryogenesis.