Genetics. Published Articles Ahead of Print: November 4, 2005, Copyright © 2005
doi:10.1534/genetics.105.048660


A more recent version of this article appeared on February 1, 2006.


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The Role of the N-Terminal Ologopeptide Repeats of the Yeast Sup35 Prion Protein in Propagation and Transmission of Prion Variants

1 Cardiology Research Center
2 University of Kent

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: mdter{at}cardio.ru.

Submitted on July 22, 2005
Revised on August 15, 2005
Accepted on 20 October 2005


Abstract

The cytoplasmic [PSI+] determinant of Saccharomyces cerevisiae is the prion form of the Sup35 protein. Oligopeptide repeats within the Sup35 N-terminal domain (PrD) presumably are required for the stable [PSI+] inheritance that in turn involves fragmentation of Sup35 polymers by the chaperone Hsp104. The nonsense suppressor [PSI+] phenotype can vary in efficiency probably due to different inheritable Sup35 polymer structures. Here, we study the ability of Sup35 mutants with various deletions of the oligopeptide repeats to support [PSI+] propagation. We define the minimal region of the Sup35-PrD necessary to support [PSI+] as amino acids 1-64, which includes the first two repeats, though a longer fragment, 1-83, is required to maintain weak [PSI+] variants. Replacement of wild-type Sup35 with deletion mutants decreases the strength of the [PSI+] phenotype. However, with one exception, reintroducing the wild-type Sup35 restores the original phenotype. Thus, the specific prion fold defining the [PSI+] variant can be preserved by the mutant Sup35 protein despite the change of phenotype. Co-expression of wild type and mutant Sup35 containing three, two, one or no oligopeptide repeats causes variant-specific [PSI+] elimination. These data suggest that [PSI+] variability is primarily defined by differential folding of the Sup35-PrD oligopeptide repeats region.

Key Words: Sup35, [PSI+], oligopeptide repeats, prion strains, yeast




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