The genomes of humans, as well as many other species are interspersed with hundreds of
thousands of tandem repeats of DNA sequences. Those tandem repeats located as codons
within open reading frames encode amino acid runs, such as polyglutamine and polyalanine.
Tandem repeats have been implicated not only in biological evolution, development,
and function but also in a large collection of human disorders. These disorders include the
polyglutamine diseases, the most common of which is Huntington’s disease, a range of
spinocerebellar ataxias, Friedreich ataxia, fragile X syndrome, myotonic dystrophy, and
polyalanine disorders. This book will present a diverse range of methods chapters, covering
the analysis of tandem repeats in DNA, RNA, and protein, in healthy and diseased states.
This will include molecular genetics, molecular biology, biochemistry, proteomics, biophysics,
cell biology, and molecular and cellular approaches to animal models of tandem repeat
disorders.
We would like to thank all the authors for their contributions and in particular their
insight and solutions to some unique methodological challenges that come from repetitive
DNA and poly-amino acid sequences.