Two new methods were used to establish a rapid and highly sensitive prenatal diagnostic test for sickle cell anemia. The first involves the primer-mediated enzymatic amplification of specific beta-globin target sequences in genomic DNA, resulting in the exponential increase (220,000 times) of target DNA copies. In the second technique, the presence of the beta A and beta S alleles is determined...

Prior research has demonstrated that globin ontogeny of hamster proceeds nearly to completion during the several days that yolk sac erythroid cells (YSEC) circulate in the embryo; synthesis of embryonic globin chains gives way to synthesis of adult globin chains in these primitive cells. In the present study, we translated total cell RNA extracted from YSEC on days 9-13 of gestation in wheat ge...

Regulated expression of genes in the beta-globin cluster depends upon sequences located between 5 and 20 kb upstream of the epsilon gene, known as the locus control region (LCR). beta-Globin expression in murine erythroleukemia (MEL) cells depends on NF-E2, a transcription factor which binds to enhancer sequences in the LCR. To gain insight into the mechanism of globin gene activation by NF-E2,...

The mouse beta-globin gene locus control region (LCR), located upstream of the beta-globin gene cluster, is essential for the activated transcription of genes in the cluster. The LCR contains multiple binding sites for transactivators, including Maf-recognition elements (MAREs). However, little is known about the specific proteins that bind to these sites or the time at which they bind during e...

We have identified a folate receptor gene upstream of the chicken beta-globin locus and separated from it by a 16 kbp region of silent chromatin. We find that this receptor is expressed only at a stage of erythroid differentiation (CFU-E) preceding the activation of beta-globin genes, consistent with the role of folate receptors in proliferation. This discovery raises the question of how these ...

Adult erythrocytes of X. laevis contain six electrophoretically resolvable globin polypeptides while tadpole erythrocytes contain four polypeptides, none of which comigrates with an adult protein. We show that three of the adult proteins are alpha globin polypeptides (alpha 1, alpha 2, alpha 3) and three are beta globin polypeptides (beta 1, beta 2, beta 3). We find that a tadpole alpha globin ...

We have identified two new histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitors (9 and 24) capable of inducing the expression of gamma-globin and/or beta-globin promoter-driven reporter genes in a synthetic model of Hb switch. Both compounds also increased, with different mechanisms, the gamma/(gamma+beta) ratio expressed in vitro by normal human erythroblasts. Compound 9 increased the levels of gamma-globin ...

We have examined whether transfected mouse erythroleukaemia (MEL) cells can be used to examine differential expression of human gamma- and beta-globin genes. These cells, which express only their adult globin genes, will transcribe the human adult beta gene but not the fetal gamma genes when they are introduced on an intact human chromosome 11 by cell fusion. However, MEL cells stably transfect...

Mutations producing beta-thalassemia reach individual gene frequencies greater than .01 in malarial-endemic regions because beta-thalassemia trait individuals have increased genetic fitness over that of normal individuals. Exon 3 of the beta-globin gene has been relatively spared as a site of common beta-thalassemia mutations. Frameshifts caused by the loss of a single nucleotide and nonsense m...