Landmark Discovery Reveals How Chromosomes Are Passed From One Generation to the Next
Critical Event Guides Accurate Distribution of Chromosomes To Eggs and Sperm
When a woman becomes pregnant, the outcome of that pregnancy depends on many things — including a crucial event that happened while she was still growing inside her own mother’s womb. It depends on the quality of the egg cells that were already forming inside her fetal ovaries. The DNA-containing chromosomes in those cells must be cut, spliced and sorted perfectly. In males, the same process produces sperm in the testes but occurs only after puberty.
“If that goes wrong, then you end up with the wrong number of chromosomes in the eggs or sperm,” said Neil Hunter, a professor in the Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics at the University of California, Davis. “This can result in infertility, miscarriage or the birth of children with genetic diseases.”
In a paper published Sept. 24 in the journal Nature, Hunter’s team reports a major new discovery about a process that helps safeguard against these mistakes. He has pieced together the choreography of proteins that connect matching chromosome pairs — ensuring that they are sorted correctly as egg and sperm cells develop and divide.
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