A search for a mammalian homologue of the Drosophila photoreceptor development gene glass yields Zfp64, a zinc finger encoding gene which maps to the distal end of mouse chromosome 2

Abstract

Whilst searching for a mammalian homologue of the Drosophila glass gene we cloned a mouse cDNA whose deduced sequence encodes a 614 amino acid (aa) protein with ten Cys2-His2 (C2H2) zinc finger (Zf) motifs. Zfp64 is expressed in all developing and mature mouse tissues examined, except the mouse erythroleukemia (MEL) cell line. Zfp64 maps to the distal region of mouse chromosome 2 close to lens opacity 4 ( Lop4), a semidominant cataract mutation. Sequence analysis shows that Zfp64 has multiple potential phosphorylation sites for casein kinase II (CK II), protein kinase C (PKC), tyrosine kinase (TK) and c-AMP- and c-GMP-dependent protein kinase (cA/GMPDPK).