Many chloroplast transcripts are protected against exonucleolytic degradation by RNA-binding proteins. Such interactions can lead to the accumulation of short RNAs (sRNAs) that represent footprints of the protein partner. By mining existing data sets of Chlamydomonas reinhardtii small RNAs, we identify chloroplast sRNAs. Two of these correspond to the 5'-ends of the mature psbB and psbH messeng...

We have identified and characterized the cis-acting sequences at the termini of the bacterial transposon Tn7 that are necessary for its transposition. Tn7 participates in two kinds of transposition event: high-frequency transposition to a specific target site (attTn7) and low-frequency transposition to apparently random target sites. Our analyses suggest that the same sequences at the Tn7 ends ...

The promoter elements in the Dictyostelium actin 15 and actin 6 genes required for full growth phase expression were identified by assaying promoter/luciferase reporter constructs. We find that these promoters contain common cis-acting elements, an actin upstream activating sequence (UAS) and sequences proximal to the transcription start site that overlap with a poly(dT) region. The actin 15 pr...

The link between polyadenylation (pA) and various biological, behavioral, and pathological events of eukaryotes underlines the need to develop in vivo polyadenylation assay methods for characterization of the cis-acting elements, trans-acting factors and environmental stimuli that affect polyadenylation efficiency and/or relative usage of two alternative polyadenylation (APA) sites. The current...

Alcohol oxidase I gene (AOX1) promoter (P(AOX1)) is a key promoter in the methylotrophic yeast Pichia pastoris. To identify the cis-acting element in the AOX1 promoter, we constructed expression plasmids in which the green fluorescent protein (GFP) gene coding region was fused to a series of internal deletion mutants of the AOX1 promoter. By analyzing the expression and transcription level of G...

Dendritic localization of mRNA/RNA involves interaction of cis-elements and trans-factors. Small, non-protein coding dendritic BC1 RNA is thought to regulate translation in dendritic microdomains. Following microinjections into cultured cells, BC1 RNA fused to larger mRNAs appeared to impart transport competence to these chimeras, and its 5' ID region was proposed as the cis-acting dendritic ta...

Apoplastic ascorbate oxidase (AO) plays significant roles in plant cell growth. However, the mechanism of underlying the transcriptional regulation of AO in Gossypium hirsutum remains unclear. Here, we obtained a 1,920-bp promoter sequence from the Gossypium hirsutum ascorbate oxidase (GhAO1) gene, and this GhAO1 promoter included a number of known cis-elements. Promoter activity analysis in ov...

The pancreatic beta-cell-specific expression of the insulin gene is mediated, at least in part, by the interaction of unique trans-acting beta-cell factors with a cis-acting DNA element found within the insulin enhancer (5'-GC CATCTG-3'; referred to as the insulin control element [ICE]) present in the rat insulin II gene between positions -100 and -91. This sequence element contains the consens...

The resistance of certain tumor cells to the chemotherapeutic agent L-asparaginase has often been found to be associated with the presence of asparagine synthetase activity. In an attempt to study the translational regulation of the asparagine synthetase gene, the 5'-untranslated region of human asparagine synthetase cDNA was mapped by antisense oligonucleotide-mediated hybrid arrest translatio...