“…In addition, spermatogenic cells feature a testis-specific isoform HI t [58]. The subtype H1" is confined to highly differentiated tissues [44] (such as liver 124, 571 or brain 148, 49, 601) and appears to be specific for mammals (for possible exceptions, see [59,661). Structural and functional homologues of the mammalian H1" are the avian and amphibian H5 histones, which * To whom offprint orders should be sent are confined to erythroid cells in birds [4, 531, whereas the amphibian H5/HI0 homologue is found in red blood cells and several nonerythroid tissues [38, 39, 511. The initial observation that H1" occurs only in terminally differentiated cells [44,571 and the experimental induction of H1" gene expression upon inhibition of DNA replication [14,27,45,471 suggested that HI" synthesis was intimately related to the resting state of a cell.…”