New chimpanzee MHC class I alleles cloned by polymerase chain reaction

We describe polymerase chain reaction (PCR) cloning of full-length Patr-A, -B and -Cw locus alleles from a chimpanzee using one sense/antisense primer pair. Of the six alleles cloned here, two have not previously been described. Comparison of nucleotide sequences between the two novel Patr alleles and various HLA alleles suggests that the new Patr-A allele belongs to the A1/A3/A11 family, whereas the new Patr-Cw allele is not closely related to any known HLA-Cw allele.