Origins of Intraindividual Genetic Variation in Human Fetuses

Intraindividual copy number variation (CNV) origin is largely unknown. They might be due to aging and/or common genome instability at the preimplantation stage while contribution of preimplantation in human intraindividual CNVs occurrence is unknown. To address this question, we investigated mosaicism and its origin in the fetuses of natural conception.

We studied normal fetuses following therapeutic abortion due to maternal indications. We analyzed the genome of 22 tissues of each fetus by array comparative genomic hybridization for intraindividual CNVs. Each tissue was studied in 2 microarray experiments; the reciprocal aberrations larger than 40 Kb, identified by comparing tissues of each fetus, were subsequently validated using quantitative polymerase chain reaction.

Through intraindividual comparison, frequency of reciprocal events varied from 2 to 9. According to the distribution pattern of the frequent CNV in derivatives of different germ layers, we found that its origin is early development including preimplantation, whereas CNVs with low frequency have occurred in later stages. Shared CNVs in both fetuses were belonged to thymus and related to the functional role of genes located in these CNVs.

The origin of some of fetal CNVs is preimplantation stage. Each organ might inherit CNVs with an unpredictable pattern due to the extensive cell mixing/migration in embryonic development.