Evolutionary conservation of excision repair in Schizosaccharomyces pombe: evidence for a family of sequences related to the Saccharomyces cerevisiae RAD2 gene.
Cells mutated at the rad13 locus in the fission yeast, Schizosaccharomyces pombe are deficient in excision-repair of UV damage. We have cloned the S.pombe rad13 gene by its ability to complement the UV sensitivity of a rad13 mutant. The gene is not essential for cell proliferation. Sequence analysis of the cloned gene revealed an open reading-frame of 1113 amino acids with structural homology to the RAD2 gene of the distantly related Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The sequence similarity is confined to three domains, two close to the N-terminus of the encoded protein, the third being close to the C-terminus. The central region of about 500 amino acids shows little similarity between the two organisms. The first and third domains are also found in a related yet distinct pair of homologous S.pombe/S.cerevisiae DNA repair genes (rad2/YKL510), which have only a very short region between these two conserved domains. Using the polymerase chain reaction with degenerate primers, we have isolated fragments from a gene homologous to rad13/RAD2 from Aspergillus nidulans. These findings define new functional domains involved in excision-repair, as well as identifying a conserved family of genes related to RAD2.
Carr
A M
AM
MRC Cell Mutation Unit, Sussex University, Falmer, Brighton, UK.
Sheldrick
K S
KS
Murray
J M
JM
al-Harithy
R
R
Watts
F Z
FZ
Lehmann
A R
AR
D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D001233:Aspergillus nidulans / Q000235:genetics; D001483:Base Sequence; D005075:Biological Evolution; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D004260:DNA Repair; D005800:Genes, Fungal; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D016254:Mutagenesis, Insertional; D009838:Oligodeoxyribonucleotides / Q000737:chemistry; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D012441:Saccharomyces cerevisiae / Q000201:enzymology / Q000235:genetics*; D012568:Schizosaccharomyces / Q000201:enzymology / Q000235:genetics*; D016415:Sequence Alignment
D009838:Oligodeoxyribonucleotides