Characterization of a novel murine testis-specific serine/threonine kinase

Using degenerate oligos corresponding to two highly conserved motifs within the protein kinase catalytic domain and a PCR-based cloning strategy, we have isolated a cDNA fragment encoding a new member of the Ser/Thr (serine/threonine) family of protein kinases. Expression analysis revealed that the fragment recognized two transcripts (1.6 and 1.4 kb) exclusively in testis. Using this fragment as a probe, we have cloned a full-length cDNA from a mouse testis cDNA library. The sequence has a 1092-bp open reading frame encoding a protein of 364 amino acids. The N-terminally localized kinase catalytic domain has all the conserved motifs found in other Ser/Thr kinases. Northern blot analysis using the full-length sequence as a probe revealed that the cloned gene corresponds to the 1.6-kb transcript, suggesting the existence of at least two testis-specific novel Ser/Thr kinases. We propose the name testis-specific kinase-1 (TSK-1) for the gene described here. A GenEMBL databank search revealed highest homology to the human gene encoding rac protein kinase-beta and the group of yeast Ser/Thr kinases encoded by SNF-1, nim-1, KIN-1 and KIN-2.