Talk:Gene conversion

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too technical[edit]

It currently reads

Gene conversion is a phenomenon in which the products of a meiotic division in an Aa heterozygous genotype are in some ratio other than the expected 1A:1a-for example 3A:1a,1a:3A,5A:3a or 3A:5a
  • What's a heterozygous genotype?
  • How can you get other rations? Is it supposed to happen or is this an error when it does?
  • Is this common?



  • Explained some of the terms, and the basic mechanism
  • Still needs more technical detail, e.g. about mismatch repair, size of converted regions, info for non-diploid genomes, etc.
  • Needs discussion of how common it is (for different genomes).
  • Also needs discussion on implications for genetic diversity and other ramifications.

--Segurador 18:00, 21 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Immune Systems of some species (chicken and rabits)[edit]

Don't the antibody generation systems of some species require this process to function? If I'm not mistaken homologous gene conversion is a diversification mechanism used for immunoglobulin V genes in some species.

Gene conversion could be premeiotic[edit]

According to Molecular Biology of the Cell, Vol. 8, 2511–2517, December 1997, Gene Conversion of Major Histocompatibility Complex Genes in the Mouse Spermatogenesis is a Premeiotic Event, Kari Högstrand and Jan Böhme http://www.molbiolcell.org/cgi/reprint/8/12/2511

On what basis does this wiki page say it is meiotic?


Gene conversion should not be viewed as an error[edit]

Gene conversion in my mind does not have to do anything with meiosis.It is an inherent event associated with homologous recombination, which can happen at any phase of the cell cycle, during DNA repair in non S phases, and during meiotic or mitotic divisions . I think gene conversion is not an ERROR, but more or less a normal part of the homologous recombination process. I think gene conversion (at least for an extent of a few bases) happens more or less in every cross-over event, but because the homologous strands are usually identical his can rarely be seen.

The designation of this process is also somewhat misleading, since it applies that it is related somehow to genes, whereas they can affect any part of the genome and affects genes just by chance. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.6.169.176 (talk) 15:11, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]


Strand vs. chromatid[edit]

With respect to this sentence:

"This conversion of one allele to the other is due to base mismatch repair during recombination: if one of the four strands during meiosis pairs up with one of the four strands of a different chromosome, as can occur if there is sequence homology, mismatch repair can alter the sequence of one of the chromosomes, so that it is identical to the other."

I fear that some people unfamiliar with the details may interpret "strand" to mean "one of the two strands of a DNA double helix," rather than a (double-stranded) chromatid. Given that this is reasonably technical issue, using the word "chromatid" with a link might be sufficient, but I'll leave that up to the experts. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ebaskerv (talkcontribs) 21:03, 23 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Source not cited[edit]

I noticed that the second paragraph under "mechanism" is seemingly paraphrased sentence-by-sentence from "Biased gene conversion and the evolution of mammalian genomic landscapes" (pg 286: section "Recombination (Crossovers and Noncrossovers) Involves Gene Conversion Current"), but the source is not cited. This seems problematic as the wording and sentence structure has just been changed slightly from the original source, without attribution. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Corvus occidentalis (talkcontribs) 06:48, 13 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

What does 'identical' mean ?[edit]

In the definition of gene conversion we use the term identical, I propose to explain further what identical means in the sentence. 92.184.104.181 (talk) 19:21, 31 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]