Monocistronic transcription is the physiological mechanism of sea urchin embryonic histone gene expression.
Abstract
Monocistronic transcription is the physiological mechanism of sea urchin embryonic histone gene expression. A Mauron , S Levy , G Childs and L Kedes Howard Hughes Medical Institute Laboratory, Stanford Medical School, Palo Alto, California, USA. ABSTRACT We have examined histone gene expression during the early stages of sea urchin embryogenesis. The five histone genes expressed at that time are contained in tandem repetitive segments. It has been suggested that adjacent coding regions and their intervening spacer sequences are transcribed into large polycistronic messenger ribonucleic acid (RNA) precursors. We have subcloned into pBR322 deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) sequences mapping either in the coding region, the 5' spacer, or the 3' spacer of the H2B histone gene. These clones were used to produce radioiodinated hybridization probes. We measured the steady-state quantity of H2B messenger RNA as well as spacer-specific RNA in the total RNA from embryos taken at various stages of development from fertilization to hatching of blastulae (0 to 22 h post-fertilization). Small amounts of RNA hybridizing to both spacer probes could be found. However, we show that these RNAs form mismatched hybrids with the spacer DNA and therefore cannot originate from the spacers present in the histone genes. We conclude that there is no detectable transcription of the spacer regions on either side of the H2B histone gene. The detection limit for RNA complementary to the 5' spacer sequence corresponds to a maximum of about three RNA molecules per cell, an amount shown to be far less than the projected steady-state pool size of a putative polycistronic transcript, if such a precursor were to be the obligatory transcript of the histone genes. (This conclusion was derived by using the known rates of production of H2B mRNA throughout early development (R. E. Maxson and F. H. Wilt, Dev. Biol., in press).) The physiologically relevant transcript of the histone genes in early development is therefore monocistronic and probably identical to the messenger RNA itself. CiteULike Connotea Delicious Digg Facebook Google+ Mendeley Reddit StumbleUpon Twitter What's this? « Previous | Next Article » Table of Contents This Article doi: 10.1128/MCB.1.7.661 Mol. Cell. Biol. July 1981 vol. 1 no. 7 661-671 » Abstract PDF Classifications Research Article Services Email this article to a colleague Similar articles in ASM journals Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in Web of Science Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of MCB Download to citation manager Reprints and Permissions Copyright Information Books from ASM Press MicrobeWorld Citing Articles Load citing article information Citing articles via Web of Science Citing articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Mauron, A. Articles by Kedes, L. Search for related content PubMed PubMed citation Articles by Mauron, A. Articles by Kedes, L. Related Content Load related web page information Social Bookmarking CiteULike Connotea Delicious Digg Facebook Google+ Mendeley Reddit StumbleUpon Twitter What's this? current issue January 2012, volume 32, issue 1 Spotlights in the Current Issue Architecture of the Yeast RNA Polymerase II Open Complex State and Regulation by TFIIF GATA-1 Establishes Cell-Type-Specific Autophagy as a Developmental Program Prickle Phosphorylation Regulates Its Localization and β-Catenin-Independent Wnt Signaling Alert me to new issues of MCB About MCB Subscribers Authors Reviewers Advertisers Inquiries from the Press Permissions & Commercial Reprints ASM Journals Public Access Policy MCB RSS Feeds 1752 N Street N.W. • Washington DC 20036 202.737.3600 • 202.942.9355 fax • journals@asmusa.org Print ISSN: 0270-7306 Online ISSN: 1098-5549 Copyright © 2011 by the American Society for Microbiology. For an alternate route to MCB .asm.org, visit: http://intl- MCB .asm.org | More Info» var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://ssl." : "http://www."); document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + gaJsHost + "google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E")); var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-5821458-11"); pageTracker._trackPageview();