title: Evidence for a NIMA-like mitotic pathway in vertebrate cells.
abstract: NIMA is essential for entry into mitosis in Aspergillus nidulans. To examine whether there is a NIMA-like pathway in other eukaryotic cell cycles, we expressed NIMA and its dominant negative mutants in two different eukaryotic systems. In Xenopus oocytes, NIMA induced germinal vesicle breakdown without activating Mos, CDC2, or MAP kinase. In HeLa cells, NIMA induced premature mitotic events without activating CDC2, whereas the mutants caused a specific G2 arrest but did not block mutant CDC2T14AY15F-induced premature entry into mitosis. A sequence essential for both these phenotypes was mapped to a region of approximately 100 amino acids lying just after the catalytic domain of NIMA that shows a significant similarity to protein interaction domains in other proteins. These results provide evidence for the existence of a NIMA-like mitotic pathway in vertebrate cells.
authors.affiliation: Molecular Biology and Virology Laboratory, Salk Institute, La Jolla, California 92037, USA.
authors.forename: K P
authors.initials: KP
authors.lastname: Lu
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Hunter
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D001233:Aspergillus nidulans / Q000235:genetics; D016203:CDC2 Protein Kinase / Q000378:metabolism; D017871:Calcium-Calmodulin-Dependent Protein Kinases; D002451:Cell Compartmentation; D002453:Cell Cycle / Q000502:physiology*; D018797:Cell Cycle Proteins; D002467:Cell Nucleus / Q000502:physiology; D002843:Chromatin / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D016195:G2 Phase / Q000502:physiology; D005786:Gene Expression Regulation; D006367:HeLa Cells; D006801:Humans; D008938:Mitosis / Q000502:physiology; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D009154:Mutation; D000072380:NIMA-Related Kinase 1; D000072379:NIMA-Related Kinases; D009865:Oocytes / Q000166:cytology; D017346:Protein Serine-Threonine Kinases / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D017231:Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-mos; D011994:Recombinant Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D013045:Species Specificity; D013329:Structure-Activity Relationship; D014981:Xenopus
chemical_list: D018797:Cell Cycle Proteins; D002843:Chromatin; D011994:Recombinant Proteins; C000606914:NEK1 protein, human; D000072380:NIMA-Related Kinase 1; D000072379:NIMA-Related Kinases; C442331:NIMA-related kinase 6; D017346:Protein Serine-Threonine Kinases; D017231:Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-mos; D017871:Calcium-Calmodulin-Dependent Protein Kinases; D016203:CDC2 Protein Kinase