Conservation of position and exclusive expression of mouse Xist from the inactive X chromosome

X-CHROMOSOME inactivation in mammals is a regulatory phenomenon whereby one of the two X chromosomes in female cells is genetically inactivated, resulting in dosage compensation for X-linked genes between males and females¹. In both man and mouse, X-chromosome inactivation is thought to proceed from a single cis-acting switch region or inactivation centre (XlC/Xic)^2-5. In the human, XIC has been mapped to band Xql3 (ref. 6) and in the mouse to band XD (ref. 7), and comparative mapping has shown that the XIC regions in the two species are syntenic⁸. The recently described human XIST gene maps to the XIC region⁶ and seems to be expressed only from the inactive X chromosome⁹. We report here that the mouse Xist gene maps to the Xic region of the mouse X chromosome and, using an interspecific Mus spretus/Mus musculus domesticus F₁ hybrid mouse carrying the T(X; 16)16H translocation, show that Xist is exclusively expressed from the inactive X chromosome. Conservation between man and mouse of chromosomal position and unique expression exclusively from the inactive X chromosome lends support to the hypothesis that XIST and its mouse homologue are involved in X-chromosome inactivation.