title: Thrombin-like enzymes from venom gland of Deinagkistrodon acutus: cDNA cloning, mechanism of diversity and phylogenetic tree construction.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To clone cDNAs of thrombin-like enzymes (TLEs) from venom gland of Deinagkistrodon acutus and analyze the mechanisms by which their structural diversity arose.
  
  
  METHODS
  Reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction and gene cloning techniques were used, and the cloned sequences were analyzed by using bioinformatics tools.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Novel cDNAs of snake venom TLEs were cloned. The possibilities of post-transcriptional recombination and horizontal gene transfer are discussed. A phylogenetic tree was constructed.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The cDNAs of snake venom TLEs exhibit great diversification. There are several types of structural variations. These variations may be attributable to certain mechanisms including recombination.
authors.affiliation: School of Life Sciences, Anhui University, Hefei 230039, China. xdcha@163.com
authors.forename: Xiang-dong
authors.initials: XD
authors.lastname: Zha
authors.forename: He-sheng
authors.initials: HS
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.forename: Li-zhi
authors.initials: LZ
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.forename: Jing
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: Kang-sen
authors.initials: KS
authors.lastname: Xu
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D018076:DNA, Complementary / Q000235:genetics*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010802:Phylogeny; D016415:Sequence Alignment; D017385:Sequence Homology; D013917:Thrombin / Q000235:genetics* / Q000302:isolation & purification; D014757:Viper Venoms / Q000737:chemistry*; D017819:Viperidae / Q000235:genetics
chemical_list: D018076:DNA, Complementary; D014757:Viper Venoms; D013917:Thrombin