Recombination hotspot

Recombination hotspots are small regions in the genome of sexually reproducing organisms that exhibit highly elevated rates of meiotic recombination. The peak recombination rate within hotspots can be hundreds or thousands times that of the surrounding region. The cause of hotspots is currently unknown, however all hotspots so far characterized share similar morphology and are approximately 1.5 to 2.0 kb in width, which suggests a common causal process. Furthermore, recent studies have used patterns in linkage disequilibrium to identify over 25,000 hotspots in the human genome, suggesting that hotspots are a ubiquitous feature of the genome.