GENETICS OF THE TUBULIN GENE FAMILIES OF PHYSARUM

Tim Schedl ¹, Judi Owens ¹, William F. Dove ¹, and Timothy G. Burland ¹

¹ McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin 53706

The organization of the - and ß-tubulin gene families in Physarum was investigated by Mendelian analysis. Restriction endonuclease-generated DNA fragments homologous to - and ß-tubulin show length polymorphisms that can be used as markers for genetic mapping. Analysis of meiotic assortment among progeny of heterozygotes allowed - and ß-tubulin sequence loci to be defined. There are four unlinked -tubulin sequence loci (altA, altB, altC and altD) and at least three unlinked ß-tubulin sequence loci (betA, betB and betC). The -tubulin loci are not linked to the ß-tubulin loci. — Segregation of tubulin sequence loci with respect to ben mutations that confer resistance to antitubulin benzimidazole drugs was used to investigate whether any members of the - or ß-tubulin gene families are allelic to ben loci. The ß-tubulin sequence locus betB is allelic to the resistance locus benD, the betA locus is probably allelic to benA and the -tubulin sequence locus altC may be allelic to benC. The molecular implications of benzimidazole resistance phenotypes when only one of the expressed ß-tubulin gene family members mutates to drug resistance are discussed in relation to tubulin function.

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