Essential genes in the hDf6 region of chromosome I in Caenorhabditis elegans.

In this paper we describe the analysis of essential genes in the hDf6 region of chromosome I of Caenorhabditis elegans. Nineteen complementation groups have been identified which are required for the growth, survival or fertility of the organism (essential genes). Since ten of these genes were represented by more than one allele, a Poisson calculation predicts a minimum estimate of 25 essential genes in hDf6. The most mutable gene in this region was let-354 with seventeen alleles. An average mutation rate of 5 x 10(-5) mutations/gene/chromosome screened was calculated for an ethyl methanesulfonate dose of 15 mM. Mutations were recovered by screening for lethal mutations using the duplication sDp2 for recovery. Our analysis shows that duplications are very effective for maintenance and mapping of large numbers of lethal mutations. Approximately 600 lethal mutations were mapped in order to identify the 54 that are in the deficiency hDf6. The hDf6 region appears to have a lower proportion of early arresting mutations than other comparably sized regions of the genome.