Structure of murine complement component C3. II. Nucleotide sequence of cloned complementary DNA coding for the alpha...

Area of Science:

• Molecular Biology
• Immunology
• Biochemistry

Background:

• The complement system is crucial for innate immunity.
• Understanding complement component structures is vital for immunological research.

Purpose of the Study:

• To determine the nucleotide and amino acid sequence of the murine complement C3 alpha chain.
• To elucidate the complete structure of the murine precursor prepro-C3 molecule.

Main Methods:

• Isolation of recombinant plasmids from a murine liver cDNA library.
• Nucleotide sequencing to derive the amino acid sequence.
• Bioinformatic analysis for predicting protein features.

Main Results:

• The murine C3 alpha chain mRNA is 2979 nucleotides long, encoding 993 amino acids.
• Calculated molecular weight of the unglycosylated alpha chain is 112,933 Da.
• Identified two potential glycosylation sites and two putative factor I cleavage sites.

Conclusions:

• The study provides the complete nucleotide and amino acid sequence of the murine C3 alpha chain.
• This data, combined with prior research, defines the full structure of the murine prepro-C3 molecule.
• The findings contribute to a comprehensive understanding of complement system components.