Abstract
It has been evident for some time that the telomeres (ends) of eukaryotic chromosomes must have properties that fulfill a number of functional requirements. For example, unlike ends of chromosome fragments, telomeres protect the natural chromosome end against fusion with other chromosome ends. They are often associated with the nuclear envelope. They pose a replication problem for the cell since all known DNA polymerases require a primer and synthesize only in the 5′→3′ direction. This implies that without a special structure, only one daughter chromosome would be completely replicated, the other being shortened, compared with the parental chromosome, by excision of a primer. This shortening would occur at each cell division and could presumably not be tolerated beyond a certain point. A number of models have been suggested that circumvent this problem (Blackburn and Szostak 1984).
Keywords
Pseudoautosomal regionTelomereBiologyChromosomeGeneticsCell divisionDNA replicationPrimer (cosmetics)Eukaryotic chromosome fine structureDNACellGeneChemistry
Affiliated Institutions
Related Publications
Telomere shortening in renal cell carcinoma.
The ends of human chromosomes consist of a specialized structure, the telomere, composed of repeats of TTAGGG making up a total of 5-15 kilobase pairs, depending on age and prol...
Telomere length predicts replicative capacity of human fibroblasts.
When human fibroblasts from different donors are grown in vitro, only a small fraction of the variation in their finite replicative capacity is explained by the chronological ag...
Telomerase activity in human ovarian carcinoma.
Telomeres fulfill the dual function of protecting eukaryotic chromosomes from illegitimate recombination and degradation and may aid in chromosome attachment to the nuclear memb...
UbcD1, a Drosophila ubiquitin-conjugating enzyme required for proper telomere behavior.
The end-to-end association of chromosomes through their telomeres has been observed in normal cells of certain organisms, as well as in senescent and tumor cells. The molecular ...
Stabilization of short telomeres and telomerase activity accompany immortalization of Epstein-Barr virus-transformed human B lymphocytes
We have measured telomere length and telomerase activity throughout the life span of clones of human B lymphocytes transformed by Epstein-Barr virus. Shortening of telomeres occ...
Publication Info
- Year
- 1986
- Type
- article
- Volume
- 51
- Issue
- 0
- Pages
- 213-219
- Citations
- 228
- Access
- Closed
External Links
Social Impact
Altmetric
PlumX Metrics
Social media, news, blog, policy document mentions
Citation Metrics
228
OpenAlex
Cite This
Howard J. Cooke,
Barbara A. Smith
(1986).
Variability at the Telomeres of the Human X/Y Pseudoautosomal Region.
Cold Spring Harbor Symposia on Quantitative Biology
, 51
(0)
, 213-219.
https://doi.org/10.1101/sqb.1986.051.01.026
Identifiers
- DOI
- 10.1101/sqb.1986.051.01.026