[Cloning and identification of a mouse zinc finger protein gene ZF-12-related pseudogene]

The mouse zinc finger protein ZF-12 gene is homologous to human gene and encodes a protein of 368 amino acids, which contains four tandem C2H2-type zinc finger motifs in the N-terminal and one SCAN domain in the C-terminal. Some recent studies suggest that ZNF191 might be a hepatocarcinogenesis-associated gene. We screened a mouse lambda genomic library with a human ZNF191 cDNA probe and isolated a ZF-12-like gene, named ZF12p (GenBank AY040222). This intronless gene closely resembles ZF-12 but displays several mutations, suggesting that ZF12p represents a ZF-12-related pseudogene. RT-PCR analysis on total RNA from mouse tissue and bioinformatis analysis on promoter region of ZF12p gene, suggest the transcripts of ZF12p may be not synthesized. BLAST on the data of the human genome in the GenBank with ZNF191 cDNA and Southern blotting show there is no any psedogene related to ZNF191 gene in the human genome. The high similarity of ZF12p to ZF-12 might be of considerable importance for mutation and evolution analysis of ZF-12.