Synonym(s)
- lyonization
- X-inactivation
Definition(s)
- In females, the phenomenon by which one X chromosome (either
maternally or paternally derived) is randomly inactivated in early embryonic
cells, with fixed inactivation in all descendant cells; first described by
the geneticist Mary Lyon
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Definition from: GeneReviews
from the University of Washington and the National Center for Biotechnology Information
- The repression of one of the two X-chromosomes in the somatic cells of females as a method of dosage compensation; at an early embryonic stage in the normal female, one of the two X-chromosomes undergoes inactivation, apparently at random, from this point on all descendent cells will have the same X-chromosome inactivated as the cell from which they arose, thus a female is a mosaic composed of two types of cells, one which expresses only the paternal X-chromosome, and another which expresses only the maternal X-chromosome.
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Definition from: Office of Rare Diseases
at the National Institutes of Health
- Lyonization is commonly known as X-inactivation. In mammals, males receive one copy of the X chromosome while females receive two copies. To prevent female cells from having twice as many gene products from the X chromosomes as males, one copy of the X chromosome in each female cell is inactivated. In placental mammals, the choice of which X chromosome is inactivated is random, whereas in marsupials it is always the paternal copy that is inactivated.
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Definition from: Talking Glossary of Genetic Terms from the National Human Genome Research Institute
See also Understanding Medical Terminology.
