Molecular characterization of a gene encoding juvenile hormone esterase in the red flour beetle, Tribolium castaneum.
Juvenile hormone esterases (JHEs) are required for the degradation of juvenile hormones (JHs) in insects. Here, we report the cloning and analysis of the jhe gene in the red flour beetle, Tribolium castaneum, a model insect of Coleoptera. The Tcjhe gene was strongly expressed at the final instar larva, as would be expected if it functioned to decrease the JH titer at this stage. A recombinant TcJHE protein efficiently degraded JH III, suggesting that the enzyme functions in vivo as a JH-specific degradation enzyme. This is the first report describing the developmental expression profile of the jhe gene whose enzymatic activity was shown in Coleoptera, and the new data reported here will aid elucidation of the mechanism of JH titer regulation in insects.
Tsubota
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T
Invertebrate Gene Function Research Unit, National Institute of Agrobiological Sciences, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, Japan.
Minakuchi
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C
Nakakura
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Shinoda
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Shiotsuki
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D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D002265:Carboxylic Ester Hydrolases / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D005091:Exons / Q000235:genetics; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling; D018507:Gene Expression Regulation, Developmental; D007438:Introns / Q000235:genetics; D007700:Kinetics; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010802:Phylogeny; D011994:Recombinant Proteins / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid; D014231:Tribolium / Q000201:enzymology* / Q000235:genetics* / Q000254:growth & development
D011994:Recombinant Proteins; D002265:Carboxylic Ester Hydrolases; C038003:juvenile hormone esterase