Identification and cloning of the CHL4 gene controlling chromosome segregation in yeast

A collection of chl mutants characterized by decreased fidelity of chromosome transmission and by minichromosome nondisjunction in mitosis was examined for the ability to maintain nonessential dicentric plasmids. In one of the seven mutants analyzed, chl4, dicentric plasmids did not depress cell division. Moreover, nonessential dicentric plasmids were maintained stably without any rearrangements during many generations in the chl4 mutant. The rate of mitotic heteroallelic recombination in the chl4 mutant was not increased compared to that in an isogenic wild-type strain. Analysis of the segregation of a marked chromosome indicated that sister chromatid nondisjunction and sister chromatid loss contributed equally to chromosome malsegregation in the chl4 mutant. A genomic clone of CHL4 was isolated by complementation of the chl4-1 mutation and was physically mapped to the right arm of chromosome IV near the SUP2 gene. Nucleotide sequence analysis of CHL4 clone revealed a 1.4-kb open reading frame coding for a 53-kD predicted protein which does not have homology to published proteins. A strain containing a null allele of CHL4 is viable under standard growth conditions but has a temperature-sensitive phenotype (conditional lethality at 36 degrees). We suggest that the CHL4 gene is required for kinetochore function in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae.