Abstract
A Cu/Zn superoxide dismutase-encoding gene (Sod) from Drosophila willistoni was cloned and sequenced. The gene shows a typical structure for a fruit-fly Sod gene, with a coding region of 462 bp in two exons separated by a 417-bp intron. Comparison of the Sod sequences from D. willistoni and D. melanogaster suggests that these species are only remotely related. Downstream from the Sod gene, there is an ORF on the opposite strand that putatively encodes the last exon of an unidentified gene. The polyadenylation signals of the two genes are separated by only 61 bp in D. willistoni, conforming to the common picture of compact dipteran genomes.
Highlights
Comparison of a D. willistoni superoxide dismutase-encoding gene (Sod) gene region with a corresponding D. virilis sequence (Kwiatowski and Ayala, 1989) reveals a conserved fragment of 120 bp downstream from Sod, starting at nt 1258 (Fig. 1). This sequence can be identified as an open reading frame (ORF) on the complementary strand to Sod
The close proximity of So& and the unidentified gene downstream on the complementary strand, together with the generally short introns encountered in dipterans (Hawkins, 1988; Kwiatowski et al, 1992a), suggest that there is evolutionary pressure towards eliminating unnecessary DNA load in these organisms
Still very short, since the putative polyadenylation signals are separated by only 80 bp
Summary
Characterization of a Cu/Zn superoxide dismutase-encoding Drosophila willistoni*. (Drosophila virilis; gene homology: gene structure; polyadenylation signal; Sophophora) gene region in. Engler: 21 December 1993: Revised/Accepted: 1 March/Z March 1994; Received at publishers: 13 June 1994
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