Telomeric and Subtelomeric Repeat Sequences

Dmitri Churikov, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA
Carolyn M Price, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA

Published online: July 2008

DOI: 10.1002/9780470015902.a0005065.pub3

Telomeric repeats are the tandem arrays of a short G-rich sequence that are present at the ends of most eukaryotic chromosomes. Subtelomeric sequences lie immediately proximal to the telomeric repeats and are composed of complex patchwork of low-copy repeated sequences, segmental duplications and degenerate telomeric repeats.

Keywords: chromosome ends; telomere; subtelomere; repeated sequence DNA; genome stability; interchromosomal recombination

Figure 1. Organization of mammalian telomeric DNA. (a) Arrangement of the telomeric repeats at a chromosome end. (b) Structure of a t-loop. 3¢ and 5¢ refer to the ends of the G- and C-rich strands, respectively.
Figure 2. Telomeric G-strand overhang can form high-order structures stabilized by nonWatson–Crick interactions between guanines. (a) The G-quartet, a planar, cyclic arrangement of four guanine bases each donating and accepting two hydrogen bonds (red). The stacking of G-quartets results in the formation of G-quadruplexes, (b) and (c), which are stabilized by monovalent metal ions located in the central cavity (grey spheres). (b) Intramolecular G-quadruplex formed by folding of a single oligonucleotide 5¢-A(GGGTTA)3GGGT-3¢. (c) Intermolecular G-quadruplex with antiparallel strands formed by dimerization of two oligonucleotides each folded in a hairpin – a model for telomere–telomere association.
Figure 3. Organization of the subtelomeric domains. Four regions are shown with the telomeric repeats at the top of the figure. The distal subtelomeric sequence contains short sequences common to many chromosomes. The arrow marks a DNA loop from one chromosome interacting with another. The proximal subtelomeric sequence consists of long sequences common to a few chromosomes (marked by dotted lines). The degenerate T2AG3 repeats mark the boundary between the distal and proximal subtelomeric sequence (ARS, autonomous replicating sequence). Reproduced from Flint et al. (1997) with permission from Oxford University Press.
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 Further Reading
    Ambrosini A, Paul S, Hu S and Riethman H (2007) Human subtelomeric duplicon structure and organization. Genome Biology 8: R151.
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    book de Lange T, Lundblad V and Blackburn E (eds) (2006) Telomeres, 2nd edn. Cold Spring Harbor, NY: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press.
    book Kipling D (1995) The Telomere. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
    Lundblad V (2002) Telomere maintenance without telomerase. Oncogene 21: 522–531.
    McEachern MJ and Haber JE (2006) Break-induced replication and recombinational telomere elongation in yeast. Annual Review of Biochemistry 75: 111–135.
    Mewborn SK, Lese Martin C and Ledbetter DH (2005) The dynamic nature and evolutionary history of subtelomeric and pericetromeric regions. Cytogenetic and Genome Research 108: 22–25.
    Riethman H, Ambrosini A and Paul S (2005) Human subtelomere structure and variation. Chromosome Research 13: 505–515.
    Riethman HC, Xiang Z, Paul S et al. (2001) Integration of telomere sequences with the draft human genome sequence. Nature 409: 948–951.
    Smogorzewska A and de Lange T (2004) Regulation of telomerase by telomeric proteins. Annual Review of Biochemistry 73: 177–208.

Related Sub-Topics:

Nucleic Acid Structure | Gene and Genome Structure and Organisation | Chromosomes and Chromatin Modifications | DNA Structure and Function | Mechanisms of Cell Death, Senescence and Metabolism
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Article Title: Telomeric and Subtelomeric Repeat Sequences
 
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Churikov, Dmitri, and Price, Carolyn M(Jul 2008) Telomeric and Subtelomeric Repeat Sequences. In: eLS. John Wiley & Sons Ltd, Chichester. http://www.els.net [doi: 10.1002/9780470015902.a0005065.pub3]