The Gts1 protein stabilizes the autonomous oscillator in yeast

Continuous cultures of Saccharomyces cerevisiae show a robust autonomous temperature compensated oscillation in many metabolic functions. Respiratory activity, a convenient output to measure, oscillates with a period of 40 min. Deletion of GTS1, whose protein product has homology to the circadian per protein, has been implicated in temporal events within yeast, causes a reduction in periodicity to 18 min (wild-type period 40-60 min). The dilution rate was steadily increased from 0.04/h to 0.085/h and the oscillation stabilized after four to six dilutions. However, Gts1p's involvement in the maintenance and generation of metabolic synchrony, and in the central oscillating loop, appear to be minimal, as the mutant oscillation was robust and autonomous. Deletion of GTS1 did cause decreased temperature compensation of the period of the oscillation from Q(10) = 1.07 for the wild-type to Q(10) = 1.6 for the mutant. Also the degree of nutrient compensation observed for the wild-type was not observed in the GTS1-null mutant strain. It is postulated that Gts1p is involved in the mechanism that communicates external conditions, such as temperature, to the central oscillating loop.