title: Complete homology maps of the rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus) and human by reciprocal chromosome painting.
abstract: Fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) was used to construct a homology map to analyse the extent of evolutionary conservation of chromosome segments between human and rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus, 2n = 44). Chromosome-specific probes were established by bivariate fluorescence activated flow sorting followed by degenerate oligonucleotide-primed PCR (DOP-PCR). Painting of rabbit probes to human chromosomes and vice versa allowed a detailed analysis of the homology between these species. All rabbit chromosome paints, except for the Y paint, hybridized to human chromosomes. All human chromosome paints, except for the Y paint, hybridized to rabbit chromosomes. The results obtained revealed extensive genome conservation between the two species. Rabbit chromosomes 12, 19 and X were found to be completely homologous to human chromosomes 6, 17 and X, respectively. All other human chromosomes were homologous to two or sometimes three rabbit chromosomes. Many conserved chromosome segments found previously in other mammals (e.g. cat, pig, cattle, Indian muntjac) were also found to be conserved in rabbit chromosomes.
authors.affiliation: Department of Laboratory Animal Science, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands. korstanje@las.vet.uu.nl
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Korstanje
authors.forename: P C
authors.initials: PC
authors.lastname: O'Brien
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.forename: W
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Rens
authors.forename: A A
authors.initials: AA
authors.lastname: Bosma
authors.forename: H A
authors.initials: HA
authors.lastname: van Lith
authors.forename: L F
authors.initials: LF
authors.lastname: van Zutphen
authors.forename: M A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Ferguson-Smith
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D002415:Cats; D002417:Cattle; D002874:Chromosome Mapping; D020223:Chromosome Painting; D017124:Conserved Sequence; D005260:Female; D005434:Flow Cytometry; D006801:Humans; D017404:In Situ Hybridization, Fluorescence; D007621:Karyotyping; D008297:Male; D018668:Muntjacs; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction / Q000379:methods; D011817:Rabbits / Q000235:genetics*; D013045:Species Specificity; D013552:Swine