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Nucleic Acids Research, 1991, Vol. 19, No. 7 1469-1474
© 1991

GENOME STRUCTURE AND MAPPING

Non-methylated islands in fish genomes are GC-poor

Sally Cross*,+, Pavel Kovarik§, Jorg Schmidtke1 and Adrian Bird+

Research Institute for Molecular Pathology Dr. Bohr Gasse 7, 1030 Vienna, Austria 1Department of Human Genetics, Medizinsche Hochschule Konstanty-Gutschow Strasse 8, D-3000 Hannover 61, FRG

* To whom correspondence should be addressed

Received January 11, 1991. Revised March 1, 1991. Accepted March 1, 1991.

In the vertebrate genomes studied to date the 5' end of many genes are associated with distinctive sequences known as CpG islands. CpG islands have three properties: they are non-methylated; the dinucleotide CpG occurs at the frequency predicted by base composition; and they are GC-rich. Unexpectedly we have found that CpG islands in certain fish only have the first two properties; that is, their GC-content is not elevated compared to bulk genomic DNA. Based on this finding, we speculate that the GC-richness of CpG islands in vertebrates other than fish is a passive consequence of a higher mutation rate in regions of open chromatin under conditions where the nucleotide precursor pools are biased.

+ Present addresses: Institute of Cell and Molecular Biology, University of Edinburgh, Darwin Building, Kings Buildings, Edinburgh EH9 3JR, UK

§ Present addresses: Institute of Biochemistry, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria


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