title: Organisation and expression of the plastid genome of the dinoflagellate Amphidinium operculatum.
abstract: We show using PCR that psbC, atpA and petB genes are present in the plastid DNA minicircles from the dinoflagellate Amphidinium operculatum, extending the set of plastid genes identified from this organism. Unusually, the petBand atpA genes are located on the same minicircle. PCR using primers based on the "core" region found on all coding minicircles revealed the existence of a number of DNA minicircles with no apparent coding function. Northern analysis of total RNA from A. operculatum showed that the petB and atpA genes are represented on separate transcripts, despite being encoded in close proximity on the same minicircle. The possibility of transcript editing was investigated by RT-PCR, but psaA, psbA, psbB and atpB transcripts showed no evidence of editing, indicating that GUA can be used as an initiation codon in A. operculatum.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry and Centre for Molecular Recognition, University of Cambridge, Tennis Court Road, Cambridge, CB2 1QW, UK.
authors.forename: A C
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Barbrook
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Symington
authors.forename: R E
authors.initials: RE
authors.lastname: Nisbet
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Larkum
authors.forename: C J
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: Howe
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D004270:DNA, Circular / Q000235:genetics; D016054:DNA, Protozoan / Q000235:genetics; D004141:Dinoflagellida / Q000235:genetics*; D017125:Genes, Protozoan; D016678:Genome; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010940:Plant Proteins / Q000235:genetics*; D018087:Plastids / Q000235:genetics*; D006180:Proton-Translocating ATPases / Q000235:genetics; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid; D012689:Sequence Homology, Nucleic Acid
chemical_list: D004270:DNA, Circular; D016054:DNA, Protozoan; C104657:PetB protein, plant; D010940:Plant Proteins; D006180:Proton-Translocating ATPases