Replication-associated strand asymmetries in vertebrate genomes and implications for replicon size, DNA replication origin, and termination

Strand compositional asymmetry has been observed in prokaryotes and used in predicting prokaryotic DNA replication origins and termini. However, it was not found in eukaryotic genomes by the same methods. We propose that transcription-associated strand asymmetries mask the replication-associated ones. By analyzing the nucleotide composition of intergenic sequences larger than 50 kb by cumulative skew diagrams (CSD), we found replication-associated strand asymmetry in vertebrate genomes. Furthermore, we found that the most common replicon sizes in vertebrates are 50–100 kb, and show evidence that the replication origin and termination regions of vertebrate genomes range from a discrete site to a broad zone.