Isolation and characterization of a soybean hsp70 gene

Soybean, like many other organisms, responds to an increase in growth temperature by producing a set of new proteins, heat shock proteins. The heat shock proteins have been classified into several categories according to their molecular weight. Data are presented on the isolation, sequence characterization, and expression of a 70 kDa heat shock protein gene from soybean. A cDNA clone was isolated using a Drosophila hsp70 clone as a heterologous probe, and the cDNA was used for isolation of the soybean gene corresponding to the cDNA. The structure of this soybean is very similar to the hsp70 genes from other organisms. It has several sequences in the 5' untranscribed region that are similar to the well characterized heat shock consensus element found in other organisms. These heat shock consensus elements have the expected position relative to the start of transcription. Unlike hsp70-like genes previously isolated from other plants, this gene does not have an intron. This protein shows high amino acid sequence similarity to other hsp70 proteins from such diverse organisms as Drosophila, rat, and Xenopus. This soybean gene is only expressed during heat shock. In addition to the hsp70 gene isolated here, there is evidence for many other hsp70-like genes in soybean.