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A naturally occurring non‐coding fusion transcript derived from scorpion venom gland: implication for the regulation of scorpion toxin gene expression
Author(s) -
Zhu Shunyi,
Li Wenxin,
Cao Zhijian
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
febs letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.593
H-Index - 257
eISSN - 1873-3468
pISSN - 0014-5793
DOI - 10.1016/s0014-5793(01)03067-8
Subject(s) - biology , coding region , gene , scorpion toxin , untranslated region , complementary dna , alternative splicing , stop codon , genetics , cdna library , venom , rna splicing , genomic dna , microbiology and biotechnology , messenger rna , scorpion , rna , biochemistry
Scorpion venom glands synthesize and secrete a great number of low molecular mass toxic peptides for prey and defense. Many cDNAs and genomic genes encoding these toxins have been isolated and sequenced. However, their expression regulation mechanism is not yet known at present. During screening of a cDNA library prepared from venom glands of the scorpion Buthus martensii Karsch, we isolated a natural fusion cDNA composed of the 5′‐untranslated region (UTR) and upstream coding sequence of a long‐chain toxin transcript and the downstream coding sequence and 3′‐UTR of a short‐chain toxin transcript. The junction site is just the overlapping region of 11 nucleotides (GGCAAGGAAAT) between the two wild transcripts, and thus leads to the formation of an early stop codon, which will cause premature translation. Based on the above observations, combined with the genomic data, we proposed a characteristic regulation mechanism of scorpion toxin genes, in which trans ‐splicing and nonsense mediated mRNA decay are involved.