A model of regulation of monoallelic gene expression

Abstract

Most higher eukaryotes are diploid organisms. Most genes are expressed from both chromosomal copies, but there are several important exceptions, in particular, the X-chromosome in mammals, imprinted genes, or genes of the immune system. In some cases, it was shown that the functioning of only one gene copy is determined by the interaction between its sense and antisense transcripts. In this work, a minimal model of strictly monoallelic expression is proposed and analyzed.