Corticotropin-releasing hormone (Crh) maps to mouse Chromosome 3

The mammalian stress response is mediated in large part via the hypothalamus-anterior pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis. The key hypothalamic releasing factor in this axis is corticotropin-releasing hormone (CRH) (Vale et al. 1983). This 41-amino-acid peptide is re-leased from the median eminence and transported via the hypophyseal portal blood system to the anterior pituitary, where it increases ynthesis of pro-opiomel-anocortin mRNA and secretion of adrenocorticotropin (ACTH; Vale et al. 1981). ACTH stimulates the pro-duction of glucocorticoids in the adrenal cortex. In addition to the role of CRH within the HPA stress axis, CRH is expressed in many other regions within the central nervous system where it is thought o in-fluence behavioral, autonomic, and immunological re-sponses to stress (Brown and Fisher 1985; Irwin et al. 1992; Koob and Bloom 1985). CRH has been assigned to human Chromosome (Chr) 8 by Southern blot analysis of somatic ell hy-brids and localized to band 8q13 by in situ hybridiza-tion of metaphase chromosomes (Arbiser et al. 1988). Synteny homology between mice and humans sug-gested that Crh would map to mouse Chr 3, 4, 8, or 15 (Nadeau et al. 1992). We mapped Crh to mouse Chr 3 using a M. spretus in terspec i f ic backcross (C57BL/6J-tg9257