Many people default to the most widely repeated number, one in ten.
Multilocus variable-number tandem-repeat analyses (MLVA) is based on variation in repeat number in tandemly repeated DNA elements on multiple loci in the genome of C. burnetii and might be more discriminatory than multispacer sequence typing (13 , 15).
In yeast, repeat number and repeat unit size dictate the susceptibility to DNA strand slippage and microsatellite instability [24], [25].
They also measured the skulls with a laser scanner, and correlated those differences with variations in repeat number.
Additionally, Wang et al (2011) developed gene-tagged markers using the difference in repeat number of di- or tri-nucleotides within GS3 for marker-assisted selection (MAS).
However, a strong reduction in repeat number was observed in mammalian Xinα proteins, suggesting that this duplicated gene may have acquired a new function in mammals that is correlated with the loss of repeats in the coding region.
Although there is large variation in repeat number across the phylogeny of Drosophila, this variation appears to be absent within the melanogaster group, in which the species that have published genome sequences all contains 3 BRC repeats.
This observation of homoplasious 3 repeat allele forms raises the question of whether the apparent stability of this form in the D. melanogaster group belies hidden expansions and contractions in repeat number.
Unequal recombination leads to a net change in repeat number for the chromatid that initiated recombination.
Microsatellites are mutation-prone and often show substantial length variation in repeat number [ 6].
