Saccharomyces cerevisiae ARS on a plasmid from Staphylococcus aureus

Staphylococcus aureus plasmid pC194 carries three sequences closely related to a consensus sequence defined previously by analysis of different genetic elements which replicate autonomously in yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Two of these enable the plasmid to replicate in yeast, the third does not. A new consensus sequence A/T T T T A T R T T T, 1 bp shorter than the previous one, can be deduced from our results. Replacement of the T with G at the position 9 of the sequence abolishes its activity. The presence of the two active sequences on pC194 genome can be explained by the A + T-rich base composition of the plasmid.