A yeast artificial chromosome contig and NotI restriction map that spans the tumor suppressor gene(s) locus, 11q22.2-q23.3.

Human chromosome 11q22-q23 is a pathologically important region in which a high level of loss of heterozygosity has been reported for breast, ovary, cervical, colon, and lung carcinomas, malignant melanomas, and hematologic malignancies. This strongly indicates that one or more tumor suppressor genes reside within the deleted region. In this report, we report the development of a contig map that covers most of the deleted regions found in these malignancies. The map comprises a contig of 66 overlapping yeast artificial chromosomes (YACs) and spans a region of 17 Mb from the PGR gene at 11q22.2 to the MLL gene at q23.3. In the process of screening the YACs, 50 new sequence-tagged site markers were developed from the termini of the YAC inserts. These markers were used for chromosome walking, and the data were then integrated into the contig map. NotI restriction mapping of these YACs revealed the presence of at least 26 NotI sites in the region. Using 22 of them, a NotI restriction map of the region from PGR to D11S939 was developed. This YAC contig will provide efficient tools for identification of the putative tumor suppressor gene(s).