title: Identification of a DinB/UmuC homolog in the archeon Sulfolobus solfataricus.
abstract: To date, eight closely related homologs of the Escherichia coli UmuC protein have been identified. All of these homologs appear to play critical roles in damage-inducible mutagenesis in enterobacteriaceae. Recently, a distantly related UmuC-homolog, DinB, has also been identified in E. coli. Using the polymerase chain reaction together with degenerate primers designed against conserved regions found in UmuC-like proteins, we have identified a new member of the UmuC-superfamily in the archeon Sulfolobus solfataricus. This new homolog shows high sequence similarity to DinB and a lower level of similarity to UmuC. As a consequence, we have called this new gene dbh (dinB homolog). Analysis of approximately 2.7 kb DNA encompassing the dbh region revealed several open reading frames (orfs). One, encoding a putative ribokinase, was located immediately upstream of dbh. This orf overlaps the dbh gene by 4 bp suggesting that both proteins might be coordinately expressed. Further upstream of the ribokinase-dbh locus was another orf encoding a potential ATPase homologous to two uncharacterized S. cerevisiae proteins (YD9346.02c and SC38KCXVI_20) and another E. coli DNA repair protein, RuvB. While this is the first report of a UmuC-like homolog in an archeon, we detected additional homologs using protein sequence comparisons in Gram-positive bacteria, cyanobacteria, and among potential human EST products, indicating that UmuC-related proteins comprise a ubiquitous superfamily of proteins probably involved in DNA repair and mutagenesis.
authors.affiliation: Section on DNA Replication, Repair and Mutagenesis, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD 20892-2725, USA.
authors.forename: O I
authors.initials: OI
authors.lastname: Kulaeva
authors.forename: E V
authors.initials: EV
authors.lastname: Koonin
authors.forename: J P
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: McDonald
authors.forename: S K
authors.initials: SK
authors.lastname: Randall
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Rabinovich
authors.forename: J F
authors.initials: JF
authors.lastname: Connaughton
authors.forename: A S
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Levine
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Woodgate
mesh_terms: D000251:Adenosine Triphosphatases / Q000235:genetics; D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D019843:Archaeal Proteins; D001426:Bacterial Proteins / Q000235:genetics*; D001483:Base Sequence; D016384:Consensus Sequence; D004249:DNA Damage; D004259:DNA-Directed DNA Polymerase; D029968:Escherichia coli Proteins; D005798:Genes, Bacterial; D006801:Humans; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D016296:Mutagenesis; D017853:Phosphotransferases (Alcohol Group Acceptor) / Q000235:genetics; D010802:Phylogeny; D016415:Sequence Alignment; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid; D016944:Sulfolobus / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D019843:Archaeal Proteins; D001426:Bacterial Proteins; C094399:DinB protein, E coli; D029968:Escherichia coli Proteins; C078202:UmuC protein, E coli; D017853:Phosphotransferases (Alcohol Group Acceptor); C022534:ribokinase; C436950:Dbh protein, Sulfolobus solfataricus; D004259:DNA-Directed DNA Polymerase; D000251:Adenosine Triphosphatases