Aha! Now I have a sense of the difference between human geneticists and fly geneticists. My son-the-geneticist addressed Andreas's question as if speaking of drosophila. (Oh well. He tried. Good son.) Thanks for posting, Andreas. Carol ----- Original Message ----- From: "Andreas Ramos" <andreas@xxxxxxxxxxx> To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Wednesday, February 01, 2006 8:51 PM Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Fw: Andreas's genetics q. > From a list member, sent offlist -- andreas > > Genetic mapping is a pretty big term. For numbers on a particular person, > it's the HLA (Human Leukocyte Antigen) map, which looks at a set of > molecules (glycoproteins) that are responsible for the way her immune > system recognizes 'self' and 'non-self'. Since rejection is a real > problem, the idea is to do transplants that the recipient body will think > of as 'self' and not have an immune system reaction to. The numbers after > the letters are simply designations of which allele (variation) the person > has at a particular site on the gene, sort of like saying "blue eyes, > brown hair, freckles" only on the chromosome level rather than the > exterior, visible one. > Matching with someone means that you have a lot of the same alleles as > they do, thus making it more likely that your bone marrow will grow in > their bones without causing them to have an immune reaction. Usually the > doctors still give immune- > suppressing drugs because there are very few perfect matches. As far as > the actual numbers, each letter combo ( A, B, C, DRB1) stands for a > different locus. The 2 digit number after 'Molecular' part is the > serologic equivalent of the antigen. The next 2 digits signify her > specific allele. If there is another number following that, it identifies > a further subtype. > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------ > To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, > digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html ------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html