Decoding of Chromosome 20 in Human Gene Is Completed

Among the 23 pairs of human chromosome, the analysis on the sequence of human chromosome 20 is virtually completed.

A British Research Group Welcome Trust, a joint Genome institute of Human Genome Project (HGP), the international genome research consortium, published the analysis of DNA and the sequence of the chromosome 20 in the Nature, which will be released on 20th, in addition to the previous success in the analysis of chromosome 22 and 21.

Chromosome 20 is thought to be related with such diseases as mad cow disease, immunizing disease, diabetes, obesity, and cataract, and therefore the completion of analysis is expected to accelerate the research for the development of medication for these diseases. A researcher in charge said, "The sequence of the 99.5 percent active area of the whole chromosome 20 DNA is determined with 99.99 percent accuracy."

Dr. Delocus said, "Comparing with the completed map and sequence of the DNA map of rat and green globefish, 727 DNA and 168 quasi-DNA were discovered."

Chromosome 20 occupies about 2 percent of the whole human genome composed of 23 pairs of genomes. The map of the smallest human chromosome 22 was completed in December 1999 and 545 DNA were newly discovered at the time. And by the completion of the chromosome 21 in May 2000, 225 DNA were found.

dongho@donga.com