Structural features of mag, a gypsy-like retrotransposon of Bombyx mori, with unusual short terminal repeats.
Mag is a retrotransposon found as an insert in the Sericin 2 gene. It is present in a few copies--4 to 15--dispersed in the genome of different strains of Bombyx mori as well as in Bombyx mandarina. Flanked by a 5 bp target sequence with no sequence specificity, it is bordered by direct repeats of 77 nucleotides. Despite their unusual short size, these terminal repeats and their immediately adjacent sequences present all the signals necessary for transcription into genomic RNA and for reverse transcription. Mag contains two overlapping open reading frames which are organized as the gag and pol genes of retroviruses and encode putative nucleic acid binding peptide, protease, reverse transcriptase, RNase H and endonuclease in this order. Sequence comparison of these proteins places mag within the gypsy group of LTR retrotransposons next to the echinoderm element SURL.
Garel
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A
Université Claude Bernard, Lyon 1, Centre de Génétique Moléculaire et Cellulaire, UMR 106, Villeurbanne, France.
Nony
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P
Prudhomme
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JC
D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D012831:Bombyx / Q000235:genetics*; D016384:Consensus Sequence; D017931:DNA Primers; D015683:Gene Products, gag / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D017344:Genes, Insect; D015750:Genes, gag; D015751:Genes, pol; D016678:Genome; D015698:Genomic Library; D007814:Larva; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D016601:RNA-Binding Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D012091:Repetitive Sequences, Nucleic Acid; D015183:Restriction Mapping; D018626:Retroelements; D012190:Retroviridae / Q000235:genetics; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid
D017931:DNA Primers; D015683:Gene Products, gag; D016601:RNA-Binding Proteins; D018626:Retroelements