The genes encoding mammalian chaperonin 60 and chaperonin 10 are linked head-to-head and share a bidirectional promoter.
Chaperonins are a class of stress-inducible molecular chaperones involved in protein folding. We report the cloning, sequencing and characterisation of the rat mitochondrial chaperonin 60 and chaperonin 10 genes. The two genes are arranged in a head-to-head configuration and together comprise 14 kb and contain 14 introns. The genes are linked together by a region of approximately 280 bp, which constitutes a bidirectional promoter and includes a common heat-shock element. Insertion of the shared promoter region between two reporter genes is sufficient to drive their expression under both constitutive and heat-shock conditions. The arrangement of the mammalian chaperonin genes suggests the potential to provide the coordinated regulation of their products in a manner that is mechanistically distinct from, yet conceptually similar to, that employed by the bacterial chaperonin (groE) operon.
Ryan
M T
MT
School of Biochemistry, La Trobe University, Bundoora, Victoria, Australia.
Herd
S M
SM
Sberna
G
G
Samuel
M M
MM
Hoogenraad
N J
NJ
Høj
P B
PB
D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D018835:Chaperonin 10 / Q000235:genetics*; D018834:Chaperonin 60 / Q000235:genetics*; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D005786:Gene Expression Regulation; D016678:Genome; D008322:Mammals / Q000235:genetics; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D011401:Promoter Regions, Genetic; D051381:Rats; D012689:Sequence Homology, Nucleic Acid
D018835:Chaperonin 10; D018834:Chaperonin 60