Search

Two major types of genetic variation are known: single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), and a more recently discovered structural variation, involving changes in copy number (CNVs) of kilobase- to megabase-sized chromosomal segments. It is unknown whether CNVs arise in somatic cells, but it is, however, generally assumed that normal cells are genetically identical. We tested 34 tissue samples from three subjects and, having analyzed for each tissue < or =10(-6) of all cells expected in an adult human, we observed at least six CNVs, affecting a single organ or one or more tissues of the same subject. The CNVs ranged from 82 to 176 kb, often encompassing known genes, potentially affecting gene function. Our results indicate that humans are commonly affected by somatic mosaicism for stochastic CNVs, which occur in a substantial fraction of cells. The majority of described CNVs were previously shown to be polymorphic between unrelated subjects, suggesting that some CNVs previously reported as germline might represent somatic events, since in most studies of this kind, only one tissue is typically examined and analysis of parents for the studied subjects is not routinely performed. A considerable number of human phenotypes are a consequence of a somatic process. Thus, our conclusions will be important for the delineation of genetic factors behind these phenotypes. Consequently, biobanks should consider sampling multiple tissues to better address mosaicism in the studies of somatic disorders.

Motivation: Copy number profiling methods aim at assigning DNA copy numbers to chromosomal regions using measurements from microarray-based comparative genomic hybridizations. Among the proposed methods to this end, Hidden Markov Model (HMM)-based approaches seem promising since DNA copy number transitions are naturally captured in the model. Current discrete-index HMM-based approaches do not, however, take into account heterogeneous information regarding the genomic overlap between clones. Moreover, the majority of existing methods are restricted to chromosome-wise analysis., Results: We introduce a novel Segmental Maximum A Posteriori approach, SMAP, for DNA copy number profiling. Our method is based on discrete-index Hidden Markov Modeling and incorporates genomic distance and overlap between clones. We exploit a priori information through user-controllable parameterization that enables the identification of copy number deviations of various lengths and amplitudes. The model parameters may be inferred at a genome-wide scale to avoid overfitting of model parameters often resulting from chromosome-wise model inference. We report superior performances of SMAP on synthetic data when compared with two recent methods. When applied on our new experimental data, SMAP readily recognizes already known genetic aberrations including both large-scale regions with aberrant DNA copy number and changes affecting only single features on the array. We highlight the differences between the prediction of SMAP and the compared methods and show that SMAP accurately determines copy number changes and benefits from overlap consideration.

To further explore the extent of structural large-scale variation in the human genome, we assessed copy number variations (CNVs) in a series of 71 healthy subjects from three ethnic groups. CNVs were analyzed using comparative genomic hybridization (CGH) to a BAC array covering the human genome, using DNA extracted from peripheral blood, thus avoiding any culture-induced rearrangements. By applying a newly developed computational algorithm based on Hidden Markov modeling, we identified 1,078 autosomal CNVs, including at least two neighboring/overlapping BACs, which represent 315 distinct regions. The average size of the sequence polymorphisms was approximately 350 kb and involved in total approximately 117 Mb or approximately 3.5% of the genome. Gains were about four times more common than deletions, and segmental duplications (SDs) were overrepresented, especially in larger deletion variants. This strengthens the notion that SDs often define hotspots of chromosomal rearrangements. Over 60% of the identified autosomal rearrangements match previously reported CNVs, recognized with various platforms. However, results from chromosome X do not agree well with the previously annotated CNVs. Furthermore, data from single BACs deviating in copy number suggest that our above estimate of total variation is conservative. This report contributes to the establishment of the common baseline for CNV, which is an important resource in human genetics.

A previously detected copy number polymorphism (Ep CNP) in patients affected with neuroectodermal tumors led us to investigate its frequency and length in the normal population. For this purpose, a program called Sequence Allocator was developed and applied for the construction of an array that consisted of unique and duplicated fragments, allowing the assessment of copy number variation within regions of segmental duplications. The average resolution of this array was 11 kb and we determined the size of the Ep CNP to be 290 kb. Analysis of normal controls identified 7.7 and 7.1% gains in peripheral blood and lymphoblastoid cell line (LCL) DNA, respectively, while deletions were found only in the LCL group (7.1%). This array platform allows the detection of DNA copy number variation within regions of pronounced genomic complexity, which constitutes an improvement over available technologies.

Meningiomas are common neoplasms of the meninges lining of the central nervous system. Deletions of 1p have been established as important for the initiation and/or progression of meningioma. The rationale of this array-CGH study was to characterize copy number imbalances of chromosome 1 in meningioma, using a full-coverage genomic microarray containing 2,118 distinct measurement points. In total, 82 meningiomas were analyzed, making this the most detailed analysis of chromosome 1 in a comprehensive series of tumors. We detected a broad range of aberrations, such as deletions and/or gains of various sizes. Deletions were the predominant finding and ranged from monosomy to a 3.5-Mb terminal 1p homozygous deletion. Although multiple aberrations were observed across chromosome 1, every meningioma in which imbalances were detected harbored 1p deletions. Tumor heterogeneity was also observed in three recurrent meningiomas, which most likely reflects a progressive loss of chromosomal segments at different stages of tumor development. The distribution of aberrations supports the existence of at least four candidate loci on chromosome 1, which are important for meningioma tumorigenesis. In one of these regions, our results already allow the analysis of a number of candidate genes. In a large series of cases, we observed an association between the presence of segmental duplications and deletion breakpoints, which suggests their role in the generation of these tumor-specific aberrations. As 1p is the site of the genome most frequently affected by tumor-specific aberrations, our results indicate loci of general importance for cancer development and progression.