A palindromic structure in the pericentromeric region of various human chromosomes.

The primate-specific multisequence family chAB4 is represented with approximately 40 copies within the haploid human genome. Former analyis revealed that unusually long repetition units ( > 35 kb) are distributed to at least eight different chromosomal loci. Remarkably varying copy-numbers within the genomes of closely related primate species as well as the existence of human specific subfamilies, which most probably arose by frequent sequence exchanges, demonstrate that chAB4 is an unstable genomic element, at least in an evolutionary sense. To analyze the chAB4 basic unit in more detail we established a cosmid contig and found it to be organized as inverted duplications of approximately 90 kb flanking a noninverted core sequence of approximately 60 kb. FISH as well as the analysis of chromosome-specific hybrid cell lines revealed a chromosomal localization of chAB4 on chromosomes 1, 3, 4, 9, Y, and the pericentromeric region of all acrocentrics. Furthermore, we can detect chAB4 sequences together with alpha satellites, beta satellites, and satellite III sequences within a single chromosome 22-specific YAC clone, indicating that chAB4 is located in close proximity to the centromere, at least on the acrocentrics. Hence, chAB4 represents an unstable genomic structure that is located just in the chromosomal region that is very often involved in translocation processes.