Identification and analysis of two snail genes in the pufferfish (Fugu rubripes) and mapping of human SNA to 20q.

All members of the snail gene family are zinc-finger transcription factors expressed early in embryonic development and are involved in the formation of tissues such as mesoderm and presumptive neural crest. Here, we report the identification and structural organisation of two snail genes in the compact genome of the pufferfish Fugu rubripes, and examine the phylogenetic relationships between these and other members of the snail gene family. Both genes have a three exon, two intron structure similar to that previously reported for human SLUG. While human SLUG has been mapped to 8q (Cohen, M.E., Yin, M., Paznekas, W.A., Schertzer, M., Wood, S., Jabs, E.W., 1998. Human SLUG organisation, expression and chromosome map location on 8q. Genomics 51, 468-471), the human sna gene SNA, was previously unmapped. We have used sequence similarity to the Fugu genes to identify a human SNA EST and mapped this by radiation hybrid and physical mapping to the distal end of human 20q. This is likely to be the mapping location of the human sna gene (SNA).