Genome organization of the linear plasmid, pSKL, isolated from Saccharomyces kluyveri

We have determined the complete nucleotide sequence of the linear DNA plasmid, pSKL, isolated from Saccharomyces kluyveri. Sequence analysis showed that pSKL has a high (A + T) content of 71.7%, and that there are 10 open reading frames (ORFs) larger than 250 nucleotides. All 10 ORFs were shown to be transcribed in S. kluyveri cells by S1 nuclease mapping analysis. The localization of ORFs, direction of transcription, and the predicted amino acid sequences of each ORF were quite similar to that of pGKL2, one of the killer plasmids found in Kluyveromyces lactis. The amino acid sequences of the largest two ORFs (ORF2 and ORF6) have homology with several DNA polymerases and RNA polymerases, respectively.