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Published on: September 20, 2024
Absence of a universal element for tRNAHis identity in Acanthamoeba castellanii
Bhalchandra S Rao1, Fuad Mohammad, Michael W Gray
1Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and Center for RNA Biology, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH 43210, USA.
Abstract:
The additional G(-1) nucleotide on tRNA(His) is a nearly universal feature that specifies tRNA(His) identity in all three domains of life. In eukaryotes, the G(-1) identity element is obtained by a post-transcriptional pathway, through the unusual 3'-5' polymerase activity of the highly conserved tRNA(His) guanylyltransferase (Thg1) enzyme, and no examples of eukaryotic histidyl-tRNAs that lack this essential element have been identified. Here we report that the eukaryote Acanthamoeba castellanii lacks the G(-1) identity element on its tRNA(His), consistent with the lack of a gene encoding a bona fide Thg1 ortholog in the A. castellanii genome. Moreover, the cytosolic histidyl-tRNA synthetase in A. castellanii exhibits an unusual tRNA substrate specificity, efficiently aminoacylating tRNA(His) regardless of the presence of G(-1). A. castellanii does contain two Thg1-related genes (encoding Thg1-like proteins, TLPs), but the biochemical properties we associate here with these proteins are consistent with a function for these TLPs in separate pathways unrelated to tRNA(His) metabolism, such as mitochondrial tRNA repair during 5'-editing.
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