STRUCTURE OF THE MOUSE OSTEOCLASTOGENESIS INHIBITORY FACTOR (OCIF) GENE AND ITS EXPRESSION IN EMBRYOGENESIS

Osteoclastogenesis inhibitory factor (OCIF) is a novel soluble-form me mber of the tumor necrosis factor receptor family and is involved in t he regulation of bone mass. Here we isolated genomic and cDNA clones f or mouse OCIF and determined their structures. Mouse OCIF gene spans 2 9 kb and contains five exons of 270, 367, 192, 225 and 1765 bp long. F our cysteine-rich domains and two death domain homologous regions char acterized in human OCIF are rigidly conserved in mouse OCIF. The onset of OCIF gene expression in mouse embryogenesis is at day 8.5. In a pr egnant female mouse, OCIF gene is expressed in decidua, a maternal tis sue surrounding each embryo, immediately after implantation. The isola tion of mouse OCIF gene should facilitate studies on OCIF knock-out mi ce for a better understanding of the role of OCIF in vivo. (C) 1998 El sevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.