Characterization and nucleotide sequence of a chicken gene encoding an opal suppressor tRNA and its flanking DNA...

A naturally occurring opal suppressor serine tRNA has been purified from chicken liver and used as a probe to isolate the corresponding gene from a library of chicken DNA in bacteriophage lambda. This minor tRNA is encoded by a single-copy gene that is not part of a tRNA gene cluster. DNA sequence analysis of the gene and its flanking DNA segments shows that the gene is encoded in an 87-base-pair segment without intervening sequences and specifies a tRNA that reads the termination codon UGA. This gene has additional nucleotides in the 5' internal promoter region but has a normal 3' internal promoter sequence and the usual termination signal.