Aberrant splicing and transcription termination caused by P element insertion into the intron of a Drosophila gene.
Insertional mutagenesis screens using the P[lacZ, rosy+] (PZ) transposable element have provided thousands of mutant lines for analyzing genes of varied function in the fruitfly, Drosophila melanogaster. As have been observed with other P elements, many of the PZ-induced mutations result from insertion of the P element into the promoter or 5' untranslated regions of the affected gene. We document here a novel mechanism for mutagenesis by this element. We show that sequences present within the element direct aberrant splicing and termination events that produce a mRNA composed of 5' sequences from the mutated gene (in this case, pipsqueak) and 3' sequences from within the P[lacZ, rosy+] element. These truncated RNAs could yield proteins with dominant mutant effects.
Horowitz
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Department of Genetics, University of Washington, Seattle 98195.
Berg
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CA
D000483:Alleles; D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D003433:Crosses, Genetic; D004331:Drosophila melanogaster / Q000235:genetics*; D005260:Female; D017344:Genes, Insect / Q000235:genetics*; D007438:Introns / Q000235:genetics; D008297:Male; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D016254:Mutagenesis, Insertional / Q000235:genetics*; D009693:Nucleic Acid Hybridization; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D011506:Proteins / Q000235:genetics*; D012326:RNA Splicing / Q000235:genetics*; D012333:RNA, Messenger / Q000235:genetics; D011993:Recombinant Fusion Proteins / Q000235:genetics; D017421:Sequence Analysis; D014158:Transcription, Genetic / Q000235:genetics
D011506:Proteins; D012333:RNA, Messenger; D011993:Recombinant Fusion Proteins