Construction of a consistent YAC contig for human chromosome region 3pl4.1

Chromosomal deletions and translocations of human chromosome region 3pl4 are observed in various human malignancies and suggest the existence of a tumor suppressor gene locus within this region. Tumors most frequently affected by these aberrations are small-cell lung cancer and renal-cell carcinoma. In continuation of our previously published YAC contig of chromosome region 3pl4.2-pl4.3, we report here on the construction of a YAC contig of at least II Mb that consisted of 171 YACs and covers the entire subregion 3pl4.1. This contig includes the t(3;8) breakpoint of a hereditary renal-cell carcinoma localized in 3pl4.2 and extends into human chromosome region 3pl2-pl3. It defines the order of 34 DNA probes in relation to reference markers D3S6 and D3S30 as well as the human protein tyrosine phosphatase-γ gene. For 31 DNA probes we identified nonchimeric YACs by fluorescence in situ hybridization. The minimal tiling pathway consists of 16 yeast artificial chromosomes. As a prerequisite for identification of a putative tumor suppressor gene within this region, this contig renders human chromosome region 3pl4.1 accessible to gene isolation.