Identification of Potential Regulatory Elements in the Human Immunoglobulin Loci

In this post-genomic era, it is necessary to formulate specific questions and develop bioinformatics tools to understand the vast amounts of information stored in DNA sequence. Using the combinatorial pattern discovery algorithm called Teiresias developed by the Bioinformatics and Pattern Discovery Group at IBM, we have identified novel conserved motifs present in the immunoglobulin loci. In the human VH promoter regions, two new putative regulatory elements have been implicated in basal transcriptional regulation of immunoglobulin. In the intergenic regions of the immunoglobulin constant region genes segments, elements were identified that are absent in similar regions of the Igβ gene. Since the expression patterns of Igβ and the Ig genes are similar such elements may have functions in activities specific to the Ig genes such as somatic hypermutation. These elements represent V gene-specific motifs identified through the use of a pattern discovery algorithm.