Patent 7985550 was granted and assigned to Johns Hopkins University on July, 2011 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
Provided is a method for isolating methylated CpG islands. The method includes identifying an imprinted gene adjacent to the methylated CpG island, and identifying a disease which is preferentially transmitted by one parent and which is genetically linked to region of genomic DNA which contains the imprinted gene, whereby the imprinted gene is thereby indicated as a candidate gene involved in transmitting the disease.