Location of genes coding for 18S and 28S ribosomal RNA within the genome of Mus musculus

Abstract

Cytological detection of cistrons coding for 18S and 28S ribosomal RNA (rRNA) within the genome of Mus musculus inbred strain SEC/1ReJ was accomplished using the technique of in situ hybridization. Metaphase chromosome spreads prepared from cultured fetal mouse cells were stained with quinacrine-HCl and photographed. After destaining, they were hybridized to Xenopus laevis tritiated 18S and 28S rRNA, specific activity 7.5 X 10(6) dpm/mug. Silver grains clustered over specific chromosomes were readily apparent after 4 months of autoradiographic exposure. The identity of the labelled chromosomes was established by comparing the autoradiographs to quinacrine photographs showing characteristic fluorescent banding of the chromosomes in each metaphase spread. The 18S and 28S rRNA was found to hybridize to chromosomes 12, 18, and 16. Statistical analysis of the grain distribution over 26 spreads revealed that the three chromosomes were significantly labelled. Grains over these chromosomes were concentrated in an area immediately distal to the centromere, a region which in chromosomes 12 and 18 in this particular strain is the site of a secondary constriction. The relative size of the secondary constrictions, long and thus prominent on chromosome 12, obvious but shorter on 18, and indistinguishable on chromosome 16, correlated with the average number of grains observed over the centromeric region of these chromosomes, 2.5, 1.0, and 0.78, respectively.