Do the tightly linked structural genes for nitrate and nitrite reductases in Aspergillus nidulans form an operon? Evidence from an insertional translocation which separates them

1979 ◽  
Vol 174 (1) ◽  
pp. 89-100 ◽  
Author(s):  
Herbert N. Arst ◽  
Keith N. Rand ◽  
Christopher R. Bailey
Keyword(s):  
Aspergillus Nidulans ◽  
Structural Genes ◽  
Nitrite Reductases ◽  
Nitrate And Nitrite ◽  
Insertional Translocation

scholarly journals The intergenic region between the divergently transcribed niiA and niaD genes of Aspergillus nidulans contains multiple NirA binding sites which act bidirectionally.

1995 ◽  
Vol 15 (10) ◽  
pp. 5688-5699 ◽  
Author(s):  
P J Punt ◽  
J Strauss ◽  
R Smit ◽  
J R Kinghorn ◽  
C A van den Hondel ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Transcription Factor ◽  
Aspergillus Nidulans ◽  
Intergenic Region ◽  
Binding Sites ◽  
Glutathione S Transferase ◽  
Nitrite Reductases ◽  
Nitrate Induction ◽  
Upstream Activating Sequence ◽  
Nitrate And Nitrite

The niaD and niiA genes of Aspergillus nidulans, which code, respectively, for nitrate and nitrite reductases, are divergently transcribed, and their ATGs are separated by 1,200 bp. The genes are under the control of the positively acting NirA transcription factor, which mediates nitrate induction. The DNA binding domain of NirA was expressed as a fusion protein with the glutathione S-transferase of Schistosoma japonicum. Gel shift and footprint experiments have shown that in the intergenic region there are four binding sites for the NirA transcription factor. These sites can be represented by the nonpalindromic consensus 5'CTCCGHGG3'. Making use of a bidirectional expression vector, we have analyzed the role of each of the sites in niaD and niiA expression. The sites were numbered from the niiA side. It appeared that site 1 is necessary for the inducibility of niiA only, while sites 2, 3, and to a lesser extent 4 (which is nearer to and strongly affects niaD) act bidirectionally. The results also suggest that of the 10 binding sites for the AreA protein, which mediates nitrogen metabolite repression, those which are centrally located are physiologically important. The insertion of an unrelated upstream activating sequence into the intergenic region strongly affected the expression of both genes, irrespective of the orientation in which the element was inserted.

scholarly journals Nitrate Respiration in Thermus thermophilus NAR1: from Horizontal Gene Transfer to Internal Evolution

Genes ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (11) ◽  
pp. 1308
Author(s):  
Mercedes Sánchez-Costa ◽  
Alba Blesa ◽  
José Berenguer
Keyword(s):  
Gene Transfer ◽  
Horizontal Gene Transfer ◽  
Nadh Dehydrogenase ◽  
Thermus Thermophilus ◽  
Nitrate Respiration ◽  
Small Plasmid ◽  
Nitrite Reductases ◽  
Nitrite Respiration ◽  
Nitrate And Nitrite ◽  
Internal Evolution

Genes coding for enzymes of the denitrification pathway appear randomly distributed among isolates of the ancestral genus Thermus, but only in few strains of the species Thermus thermophilus has the pathway been studied to a certain detail. Here, we review the enzymes involved in this pathway present in T. thermophilus NAR1, a strain extensively employed as a model for nitrate respiration, in the light of its full sequence recently assembled through a combination of PacBio and Illumina technologies in order to counteract the systematic errors introduced by the former technique. The genome of this strain is divided in four replicons, a chromosome of 2,021,843 bp, two megaplasmids of 370,865 and 77,135 bp and a small plasmid of 9799 pb. Nitrate respiration is encoded in the largest megaplasmid, pTTHNP4, within a region that includes operons for O2 and nitrate sensory systems, a nitrate reductase, nitrate and nitrite transporters and a nitrate specific NADH dehydrogenase, in addition to multiple insertion sequences (IS), suggesting its mobility-prone nature. Despite nitrite is the final product of nitrate respiration in this strain, the megaplasmid encodes two putative nitrite reductases of the cd1 and Cu-containing types, apparently inactivated by IS. No nitric oxide reductase genes have been found within this region, although the NorR sensory gene, needed for its expression, is found near the inactive nitrite respiration system. These data clearly support that partial denitrification in this strain is the consequence of recent deletions and IS insertions in genes involved in nitrite respiration. Based on these data, the capability of this strain to transfer or acquire denitrification clusters by horizontal gene transfer is discussed.

scholarly journals nirA, the pathway-specific regulatory gene of nitrate assimilation in Aspergillus nidulans, encodes a putative GAL4-type zinc finger protein and contains four introns in highly conserved regions.

1991 ◽  
Vol 11 (11) ◽  
pp. 5746-5755 ◽  
Author(s):  
G Burger ◽  
J Strauss ◽  
C Scazzocchio ◽  
B F Lang
Keyword(s):  
Amino Acids ◽  
Aspergillus Nidulans ◽  
Zinc Finger ◽  
Zinc Finger Protein ◽  
Regulatory Gene ◽  
Wild Type ◽  
Transcript Levels ◽  
Amino Terminal ◽  
Nitrate And Nitrite ◽  
Acidic Region

The nucleotide sequence of nirA, mediating nitrate induction in Aspergillus nidulans, has been determined. Alignment of the cDNA and the genomic DNA sequence indicates that the gene contains four introns and encodes a protein of 892 amino acids. The deduced NIRA protein displays all characteristics of a transcriptional activator. A putative double-stranded DNA-binding domain in the amino-terminal part comprises six cysteine residues, characteristic for the GAL4 family of zinc finger proteins. An amino-terminal highly acidic region and two proline-rich regions are also present. The nucleotide sequences of two mutations were determined after they were mapped by transformation with overlapping DNA fragments, amplified by the polymerase chain reaction. nirA87, a mutation conferring noninducibility by nitrate and nitrite, has a -1 frameshift at triplet 340, which eliminates 549 C-terminal amino acids from the polypeptide. Under the assumption that the truncated polypeptide is stable, it comprises the zinc finger domain and the acidic region, which seem not sufficient for transcriptional activation. nirAd-106, an allele conferring nitrogen metabolite derepression of nitrate and nitrite reductase activity, includes two transitions, changing a glutamic acid to a lysine and a valine to an alanine, situated between a basic and a proline-rich region of the protein. Northern (RNA) analysis of the wild type and of constitutive (nirAc) and derepressed (nirAd) mutants show that the nirA transcript does not vary between these strains, being in all cases constitutively expressed. On the other hand, transcript levels of structural genes (niaD and niiA) do vary, being highly inducible in the wild type but constitutively expressed in the nirAc mutant. The nirAd mutant appears phenotypically derepressed, because the niaD and niiA transcript levels are overinduced in the presence of nitrate but are still partially repressed in the presence of ammonium.

scholarly journals Erratum

1987 ◽  
Vol 50 (2) ◽  
pp. 166-166
Author(s):  
Mark X. Caddick ◽  
Herbert N. Arst
Keyword(s):  
Aspergillus Nidulans ◽  
Structural Genes

Genet. Res., Camb. (1986), 47, pp. 83–91Structural Genes for Phosphatases in Aspergillus nidulansA labelling error caused nimD-4 to be substituted for nimQ-20. The nim locus shown in Fig. 3 (p. 88) is nimQ not nimD. The genotypes of strains given in the legend to Fig. 3 should read nimQ-20 in place of nimD-4.

scholarly journals Mutational Analysis of AREA, a Transcriptional Activator Mediating Nitrogen Metabolite Repression in Aspergillus nidulans and a Member of the “Streetwise” GATA Family of Transcription Factors

1998 ◽  
Vol 62 (3) ◽  
pp. 586-596 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard A. Wilson ◽  
Herbert N. Arst
Keyword(s):  
Transcription Factor ◽  
Transcription Factors ◽  
Dna Binding ◽  
Aspergillus Nidulans ◽  
Transcriptional Activator ◽  
Structural Genes ◽  
Gata Factor ◽  
Mutational Change ◽  
Nitrogen Metabolite Repression ◽  
Gata Family

SUMMARY The transcriptional activator AREA is a member of the GATA family of transcription factors and mediates nitrogen metabolite repression in the fungus Aspergillus nidulans. The nutritional versatility of A. nidulans and its amenability to classical and reverse genetic manipulations make the AREA DNA binding domain (DBD) a useful model for analyzing GATA family DBDs, particularly as structures of two AREA-DNA complexes have been determined. The 109 extant mutant forms of the AREA DBD surveyed here constitute one of the highest totals of eukaryotic transcription factor DBD mutants, are discussed in light of the roles of individual residues, and are compared to corresponding mutant sequence changes in other fungal GATA factor DBDs. Other topics include delineation of the DBD using both homology and mutational truncation, use of frameshift reversion to detect regions of tolerance to mutational change, the finding that duplication of the DBD can apparently enhance AREA function, and use of the AREA system to analyze a vertebrate GATA factor DBD. Some major points to emerge from work on the AREA DBD are (i) tolerance to sequence change (with retention of function) is surprisingly great, (ii) mutational changes in a transcription factor can have widely differing, even opposing, effects on expression of different structural genes so that monitoring expression of one or even several structural genes can be insufficient and possibly misleading, and (iii) a mutational change altering local hydrophobic packing and DNA binding target specificity can markedly influence the behavior of mutational changes elsewhere in the DBD.

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