Specific DNA methylation sites in the vicinity of the chicken β-globin genes

METHYLATION of cytosine is the only post-synthetic modification so far detected in the DNA of higher eukaryotes and thus has been made the basis of several proposed mechanisms of gene activity and cellular differentiation1–3. All evidence indicates, however, that the overall content of 5-methylcytosine in DNA does not vary significantly between different tissues of the same organism and does not change throughout at least some steps of differentiation4–6. As 5-methylcytosine occurs predominantly in the dinucleotide sequence CpG (ref. 7) and as a number of bacterial restriction endonucleases can distinguish whether this sequence is methylated or unmethylated, it is now possible to investigate DNA methylation patterns in the vicinity of single genes8. In this report, we use this technique to provide a correlation between DNA methylation and the activity of the chicken β-globin genes.

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