Cutting Edge: A cis-Acting DNA Element Targets AID-Mediated Sequence Diversification to the Chicken Ig Light Chain Gene Locus

Somatic hypermutation and gene conversion are two closely related processes that increase the diversity of the primary Ig repertoire. Both processes are initiated by the activation-induced cytidine deaminase that converts cytosine residues to uracils in a transcription-dependent manner; these lesions are subsequently fixed in the genome by direct replication and error-prone DNA repair. Two alternative mechanisms were proposed to explain why this mutagenic activity is targeted almost exclusively to Ig loci: 1) specific cis-acting DNA sequences; or 2) very high levels of Ig gene transcription. In this study we now identify a novel 3' regulatory region in the chicken Ig light chain gene containing not only a classical transcriptional enhancer but also cis-acting DNA elements essential for targeting activation-induced cytidine deaminase-mediated sequence diversification to this locus.