title: Sequence and characterization of two HSP70 genes in the colonial protochordate Botryllus schlosseri.
abstract: Two genes belonging to the heat shock protein 70 gene family have been cloned from the colonial protochordate Botryllus schlosseri. The two intronless genes (HSP70.1 and HSP70.2) exhibit 93.6% sequence identity within the predicted coding region, and 83.3% and 81.7% sequence identity in the 5' and 3' flanking regions, respectively. The predicted amino acid sequences are 95% identical and contain several signatures characteristic of cytoplasmic eukaryotic HSP70 genes (Gupta et al. 1994; Rensing and Maier 1994). Northern blotting and sequence analysis suggest that both genes are heat-inducible members of the HSP70 gene family. Given these characteristics, HSP70.1 and HSP70.2 appear to be good candidates for protochordate homologues of the major histocompatibility complex-linked HSP70 genes of human, mouse, and rat (Milner and Campbell 1990; Walter et al. 1994). Further experiments to determine whether there is functional evidence for such similarity are in progress.
authors.affiliation: Stanford University, Department of Pathology, Stanford University Medical Center, Stanford, CA 94305, USA.
authors.forename: M B
authors.initials: MB
authors.lastname: Fagan
authors.forename: I L
authors.initials: IL
authors.lastname: Weissman
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D015152:Blotting, Northern; D015139:Blotting, Southern; D018840:HSP70 Heat-Shock Proteins / Q000235:genetics*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010802:Phylogeny; D014561:Urochordata / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D018840:HSP70 Heat-Shock Proteins