title: Molecular characterization of an aberrant mercury resistance transposable element from an environmental Acinetobacter strain.
abstract: We present the complete nucleotide sequence of a mer operon located on a 60-kb conjugative plasmid pKLH2 from an environmental bacterium, Acinetobacter calcoaceticus, isolated from a mercury mine. The pKLH2 mer operon has essentially the same gene organization as that of Tn21 and Tn501 from clinical bacteria. The pKLH2 mer operon nucleotide sequence shows 85.5% identity with the Tn501 and 80.9% identity with the Tn21 sequences. Vestigial sequences have been found at the ends of the pKLH2 mer operon, indicating that the pKLH2 mer operon was once a part of a Tn21-like transposon, which had committed suicide by an aberrant resolution event.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Molecular Genetics, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow.
authors.forename: G Y
authors.initials: GY
authors.lastname: Kholodii
authors.forename: Z
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Gorlenko
authors.forename: O L
authors.initials: OL
authors.lastname: Lomovskaya
authors.forename: S Z
authors.initials: SZ
authors.lastname: Mindlin
authors.forename: O V
authors.initials: OV
authors.lastname: Yurieva
authors.forename: V G
authors.initials: VG
authors.lastname: Nikiforov
mesh_terms: D000150:Acinetobacter / Q000235:genetics*; D001426:Bacterial Proteins / Q000096:biosynthesis / Q000235:genetics; D001483:Base Sequence; D003227:Conjugation, Genetic; D004251:DNA Transposable Elements; D004268:DNA-Binding Proteins / Q000096:biosynthesis / Q000235:genetics; D004352:Drug Resistance, Microbial / Q000235:genetics*; D005144:F Factor / Q000235:genetics*; D005798:Genes, Bacterial; D008628:Mercury / Q000633:toxicity*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D009713:Nucleotidyltransferases / Q000378:metabolism; D009876:Operon; D015183:Restriction Mapping; D012689:Sequence Homology, Nucleic Acid; D019895:Transposases
chemical_list: D001426:Bacterial Proteins; D004251:DNA Transposable Elements; D004268:DNA-Binding Proteins; C051124:MerR protein, Bacteria; D009713:Nucleotidyltransferases; D019895:Transposases; D008628:Mercury