Synonymous codon usage in Kluyveromyces lactis

The nature and variation of synonymous codon usage in 47 open reading frames from Kluyveromyces lactis have been investigated. Using multivariate statistical analysis, a single major trend among K. lactis genes was identified that differentiates among genes by expression level: highly expressed genes have high codon usage bias, while genes of low expression level have low bias. A relatively minor secondary trend differentiates among genes according to G+C content at silent sites. In these respects, K. lactis is similar to both Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Candida albicans, and the same 'optimal' codons appear to be selected in highly expressed genes in all three species. In addition, silent sites in K. lactis and S. cerevisiae have similar G+C contents, but in C. albicans genes they are more A+T-rich. Thus, in all essential features, codon usage in K. lactis is very similar to that in S. cerevisiae, even though silent sites in genes compared between these two species have undergone sufficient mutation to be saturated with changes. We conclude that the factors influencing overall codon usage, namely mutational biases and the abundances of particular tRNAs, have not diverged between the two species. Nevertheless, in a few cases, codon usage differs between homologous genes from K. lactis and S. cerevisiae. The strength of codon usage bias in cytochrome c genes differs considerably, presumably because of different expression patterns in the two species. Two other, linked, genes have very different G+C content at silent sites in the two species, which may be a reflection of their chromosomal locations. Correspondence analysis was used to identify two open reading frames with highly atypical codon usage that are probably not genes.