CONFIRMATION OF THE LOCALIZATION OF THE HUMAN GABA-A-RECEPTOR ALPHA-1-SUBUNIT GENE (GABRA1) TO DISTAL 5Q BY LINKAGE ANALYSIS

The GABAA receptor is the major inhibitory neurotransmitter receptor in the mammalian brain. To date, 14 genes that encode subunits of this receptor have been identified; these appear to be scattered throughout the human genome and are under investigation as candidate loci for a number of neurological and psychiatric disorders. We report here a highly polymorphic (dC-dA)n repeat within the human α1-subunit gene (GABRA1). Typing of this marker in the Centre d'Etude du Polymorphisme Humain (CEPH) panel of families confirms the previous assignment of the GABRA1 locus to the distal portion of chromosome 5q by demonstrating linkage to the markers CRI-L45 (D5S61) (Zmax = 11.00, θmax = 0.15), CRI-V1022 (D5S54) (Zmax = 7.25, θmax = 0.20), and CRI-P148 (D5S72) (Zmax = 5.71, θmax = 0.24). © 1992 Academic Press, Inc. All rights reserved.