Delineation of genomic deletion in cardiomyopathic hamster

Abstract
Cardiomyopathic hamster is a representative animal model for autosomal recessive cardiomyopathy. We have previously shown that the transcript of δ‐sarcoglycan is missing in the heart of cardiomyopathic hamster due to genomic deletion. Here we define the normal genomic region deleted in cardiomyopathic hamster, which spans about 30 kb interval and includes the two first exons of the δ‐sarcoglycan gene. RNA blot analysis using genomic DNA fragments covering the entire deletion as probes failed to detect any transcript other than δ‐sarcoglycan in normal hamster heart, suggesting that δ‐sarcoglycan is the only transcript defective in the heart of cardiomyopathic hamster.