Scooter, a New Active Transposon in Schizophyllum commune, Has Disrupted Two Genes Regulating Signal Transduction

Corresponding author: Thomas J. Fowler, Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics, 208 Stafford Hall, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT 05405., tfowler{at}zoo.uvm.edu (E-mail)

Communicating editor: M. E. ZOLAN

Two copies of scooter, a DNA-mediated transposon in the basidiomycetous fungus Schizophyllum commune, were characterized. Scooter is the first transposon isolated from S. commune. Scooter creates 8-bp target site duplications, comparable to members of the hAT superfamily, and has 32-bp terminal inverted repeats. Both copies of scooter are nonautonomous elements capable of movement. Southern blot hybridizations show that scooter-related sequences are present in all S. commune strains tested. Scooter-1 was identified initially as an insertion in the Bß2 pheromone receptor gene, bbr2, leading to a partial defect in mating. Scooter-2 spontaneously disrupted a gene to produce the frequently occurring morphological mutant phenotype known as thin. The scooter-2 insert permitted cloning of the disrupted gene, thn1, which encodes a putative regulator of G protein signaling (RGS) protein. Spontaneous insertion of scooter into genes with identifiable mutant phenotypes constitutes the first evidence of active transposition of a DNA-mediated transposon in a basidiomycete.

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