The HERV-W/7q family in the human genome. Potential for protein expression and gene regulation.
A new family of human endogenous retroviruses has recently been discovered. The best known example of a full length member of this family, HERV-W/7q, is located on chromosome 7. HERV-W/7q is characterized by a long open reading frame within its env gene which is expressed in various tissues, and mainly in placenta, as a protein that we called enverin. A search for new retroviral sequences related to the HERV-W/7q family allowed the characterization of such elements in chromosome 6. A novel full length HERV with an env gene of the HERV-W/7q type, potentially encoding a truncated form of enverin has been identified on chromosome 10. The distribution of HERV-W/7q related sequences close to or within genes offers the possibility that the expression of these genes may be regulated by their companion retroviral sequences.
Alliel
Patrick M
PM
INSERM U-488, Bâtiment Gregory Pincus, Le Kremlin-Bicêtre, France. alliel@kb.inserm.fr
Périn
Jean-Pierre
JP
Goudou
Danièle
D
Bitoun
Marc
M
Robert
Brigitte
B
Rieger
François
F
D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D001483:Base Sequence; D020077:Endogenous Retroviruses / Q000235:genetics*; D015686:Gene Products, env / Q000235:genetics; D015894:Genome, Human; D006801:Humans; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction
D015686:Gene Products, env