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Background: No F8 genetic abnormality is detected in approximately 1% to 2% of patients with severe hemophilia A (HA) using conventional genetic approaches. In these patients, deep intronic variation or F8 disrupting genomic rearrangement could be causal., Objectives: The study aimed to identify the causal variation in families with a history of severe HA for whom genetic investigations failed., Methods: We performed whole F8 gene sequencing in 8 propositi. Genomic rearrangements were confirmed by Sanger sequencing of breakpoint junctions and/or quantitative polymerase chain reaction., Results: A structural variant disrupting F8 was found in each propositus, so that all the 815 families with a history of severe HA registered in our laboratory received a conclusive genetic diagnosis. These structural variants consisted of 3 balanced inversions, 3 large insertions of gained regions, and 1 retrotransposition of a mobile element. The 3 inversions were 105 Mb, 1.97 Mb, and 0.362 Mb in size. Among the insertions of gained regions, one corresponded to the insertion of a 34 kb gained region from chromosome 6q27 in F8 intron 6, another was the insertion of a 447 kb duplicated region from chromosome 9p22.1 in F8 intron 14, and the last one was the insertion of an Xq28 349 kb gained in F8 intron 5., Conclusion: All the genetically unsolved cases of severe HA in this cohort were due to structural variants disrupting F8. This study highlights the effectiveness of whole F8 sequencing to improve the molecular diagnosis of HA when the conventional approach fails., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interests There are no competing interests to disclose., (Copyright © 2024 International Society on Thrombosis and Haemostasis. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Chromoanagenesis is a cellular mechanism that leads to complex chromosomal rearrangements (CCR) during a single catastrophic event. It may result in loss and/or gain of genetic material and may be responsible for various phenotypes. These rearrangements are usually sporadic. However, some familial cases have been reported. Here, we studied six families in whom an asymptomatic or paucisymptomatic parent transmitted a CCR to its offspring in an unbalanced manner. The rearrangements were characterized by karyotyping, fluorescent in situ hybridization, chromosomal microarray (CMA) and/or whole genome sequencing (WGS) in the carrier parents and offspring. We then hypothesized meiosis-pairing figures between normal and abnormal parental chromosomes that may have led to the formation of new unbalanced rearrangements through meiotic recombination. Our work indicates that chromoanagenesis might be associated with a normal phenotype and normal fertility, even in males, and that WGS may be the only way to identify these events when there is no imbalance. Subsequently, the CCR can be transmitted to the next generation in an unbalanced and unpredictable manner following meiotic recombination. Thereby, prenatal diagnosis using CMA should be proposed to these families to detect any pathogenic imbalances in the offspring., (© 2022 John Wiley & Sons A/S. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)

Background: Recently, our group has reported a 13-bp deletion in a poly(T)-track in the F8 intron 13 as the causative variant in approximately 6% of all cases of mild haemophilia A (HA) in France. The systematic screening of mild HA patients for this deletion identified individuals carrying deletions from 9 to 14-bp in the same region., Aims: To demonstrate that these highly prevalent deletions could result from a recurrent molecular mechanism and to determine the clinical significance of deletions other than 13-bp in size., Methods: Haplotype analysis using five polymorphic markers was performed in 71 unrelated French mild hemophilia A patients. Minigene analysis was performed to study the splicing impact of deletions from 1 to 14-bp., Results: A peculiar haplotype (H1) was identified in 22.5% of patients carrying the 13-bp deletion. Haplotypes differing from H1 only for the two most distal markers were found in more than the half of patients. These results confirmed the founder effect origin for the 13-bp deletion. However, the 9 patients carrying other sizes of deletion had a different haplotype suggesting that these deletions arose independently. Supporting the recurrent mechanism hypothesis, similar deletions were also found in 3/19 genetically unresolved mild Canadian patients. In vitro splicing analysis confirmed that deletions larger than 9-bp had a deleterious impact on splicing of F8 transcript., Conclusion: We demonstrated that the poly(T)-track in F8 intron 13 is a deletion hotspot. We recommend that deletions in this region should be specifically investigated in all genetically unresolved mild HA patients., (© 2020 International Society on Thrombosis and Haemostasis.)

Essentials No F8 genetic abnormality is detected in about 2% of severe hemophilia A patients. Detection of F8 structural variants remains a challenge. We identified a new F8 rearrangement in a severe hemophilia A patient using nanopore sequencing. We highlight the value of single-molecule long-read sequencing technologies in a genomics laboratory., Background: No F8 genetic abnormality is detected in about 2% of severe hemophilia A patients using conventional genetic approaches. In these patients, deep intronic variation or F8 disrupting genomic rearrangement could be causal., Objective: To characterize, in a genetically unresolved severe hemophilia A patient, a new Xq28 rearrangement disrupting F8 using comprehensive molecular techniques including nanopore sequencing., Results: Long-range polymerase chain reaction (PCR) performed throughout F8 identified a nonamplifiable region in intron 25 indicating the presence of a genomic rearrangement. F8 messanger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) analysis including 3'rapid amplification of complementary deoxyribonucleic acid (cDNA) ends and nanopore sequencing found the presence of a F8 fusion transcript in which F8 exon 26 was replaced by a 742-bp pseudoexon corresponding to a noncoding region located at the beginning of the long arm of chromosome X (Xq12; chrX: 66 310 352-66 311 093, GRCh37/hg19). Cytogenetic microarray analysis found the presence of a Xq11.1q12 gain of 3.8 Mb. The PCR amplification of junction fragments and fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH) analysis found that the Xq11q12 duplicated region was inserted in the F8 intron 25 genomic region., Conclusion: We characterized a novel genomic rearrangement in which a 3.8-Mb Xq11.1q12 gain inserted in the F8 intron 25 led to an aberrant fusion transcript in a patient with severe hemophilia A (HA), using comprehensive molecular techniques. This study highlights the value of single-molecule long-read sequencing technologies for molecular diagnosis of HA especially when conventional genetic approaches have failed., (© 2019 International Society on Thrombosis and Haemostasis.)