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Identifying Amino Acid Overproducers Using Rare-Codon-Rich Markers
Published on: June 24, 2019
All roads lead to arginine: the squid protamine gene
John D Lewis1, Miriam E de Jong, Sabira M Bagha
1Department of Biochemistry and Microbiology, University of Victoria, P.O. Box 3055, Petch Building Room 220, Victoria, B.C., V8W 3P6, Canada.
Abstract:
The protamine of squid is one of the most arginine-rich protamines (77%, mol/mol). It possesses a leading sequence that is posttranslationally removed during spermatogenesis in a manner that is analogous to that observed in some of its vertebrate protamine counterparts. In this paper we describe the gene sequence of the protamine of the squid Loligo opalescens. This represents the first complete gene sequence ever reported for an invertebrate protamine. Like those of vertebrate protamines, the messenger RNA is polyadenylated but the gene does not contain an intron. The promoter region contains the major transcriptional regulatory elements (CRE, TATA box, and CAP) that are also characteristic of the vertebrate protamine genes. It is unclear whether the similarities of protamines in species from both the deuterostome and the protostome branches represent the result of phylogenetic conservation or evolutionary convergence.
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