Isolation and characterization of an alpha-tubulin gene from Leishmania enriettii

An alpha-tubulin gene of Leishmania enriettii has been identified in genomic Southern blots by hybridization with a heterologous alpha-tubulin gene from Drosophila melanogaster. A clone containing this gene has been isolated from a plasmid library of size-selected L. enriettii DNA. It was identified by hybridization with the D. melanogaster tubulin gene. The cloned DNA fragment was characterized by restriction analysis and partial DNA sequence analysis. The cloned DNA fragment is 2 kb in length, bounded by Pst I sites, and appears to contain the entire coding region of the alpha-tubulin gene.