Terminal osseous dysplasia is caused by a single recurrent mutation in the FLNA gene.

Terminal osseous dysplasia (TOD) is an X-linked dominant male-lethal disease characterized by skeletal dysplasia of the limbs, pigmentary defects of the skin, and recurrent digital fibroma with onset in female infancy. After performing X-exome capture and sequencing, we identified a mutation at the last nucleotide of exon 31 of the FLNA gene as the most likely cause of the disease. The variant c.5217G>A was found in six unrelated cases (three families and three sporadic cases) and was not found in 400 control X chromosomes, pilot data from the 1000 Genomes Project, or the FLNA gene variant database. In the families, the variant segregated with the disease, and it was transmitted four times from a mildly affected mother to a more seriously affected daughter. We show that, because of nonrandom X chromosome inactivation, the mutant allele was not expressed in patient fibroblasts. RNA expression of the mutant allele was detected only in cultured fibroma cells obtained from 15-year-old surgically removed material. The variant activates a cryptic splice site, removing the last 48 nucleotides from exon 31. At the protein level, this results in a loss of 16 amino acids (p.Val1724_Thr1739del), predicted to remove a sequence at the surface of filamin repeat 15. Our data show that TOD is caused by this single recurrent mutation in the FLNA gene. Copyright 2010 The American Society of Human Genetics. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.