The mouse gap junction gene connexin29 is highly expressed in sciatic nerve and regulated during brain development

A novel mouse gap junction gene, coding for a presumptive protein of 258 am ino acids (molecular mass: 28 981 Da), has been designated connexin29. This single copy gene was mapped to distal mouse chromosome 5 and shows 75% seq uence identity to a human connexin30.2 sequence in the database. Connexin29 mRNA (4.4 kb) is highly expressed in mouse sciatic nerve and less abundant in spinal cord as well as in adult brain, where it increased 12-fold betwe en day 7 and 14 post partum. Our expression data suggest that the new conne xin gene is active in myelin-forming glial cells.