Skip to main content
PMC home page
Genetics logoLink to Genetics
. 1990 Mar;124(3):533–545. doi: 10.1093/genetics/124.3.533

The Subtelomeric Y' Repeat Family in Saccharomyces Cerevisiae: An Experimental System for Repeated Sequence Evolution

E J Louis 1, J E Haber 1
PMCID: PMC1203947  PMID: 2179052

Abstract

The subtelomeric Y' repeated sequence families in two divergent strains of the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae have been characterized in terms of copy number, location and restriction site differences. The strain YP1 has 26 to 30 Y's that fall into two previously described, long (6.7 kb) and short (5.2 kb), size classes. These Y's reside at 19 of the 32 chromosome ends and are concentrated in the higher molecular weight chromosomes. Five ends contain tandem arrays, each of which has only one size class of Y's. There is restriction site homogeneity among the Y's of YP1 even between size classes. The Y's of strain Y55 contrast sharply with the Y's of YP1 in terms of copy number, location and sequence differences. There are 14 to 16 Y's, both long and short, most of which are found at different chromosome ends than those of YP1. None of these are tandemly arrayed. Four to six of the Y's appear degenerate in that they have homology with a telomere distal end Y' probe but no homology with sequences at the telomere proximal end. The majority of the Y55 Y's have the same restriction sites as in YP1. Despite the conservation of restriction sites among Y's, a great deal of restriction fragment length heterogeneity between the strains is observed. The characterized Y' repeated sequence families provide an experimental system in which repeated sequence interactions and subsequent evolution can be studied.

Full Text

The Full Text of this article is available as a PDF (4.5 MB).

Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

  1. Calvin N. M., Hanawalt P. C. High-efficiency transformation of bacterial cells by electroporation. J Bacteriol. 1988 Jun;170(6):2796–2801. doi: 10.1128/jb.170.6.2796-2801.1988. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  2. Carle G. F., Olson M. V. An electrophoretic karyotype for yeast. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1985 Jun;82(11):3756–3760. doi: 10.1073/pnas.82.11.3756. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  3. Carle G. F., Olson M. V. Separation of chromosomal DNA molecules from yeast by orthogonal-field-alternation gel electrophoresis. Nucleic Acids Res. 1984 Jul 25;12(14):5647–5664. doi: 10.1093/nar/12.14.5647. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  4. Carlson M., Celenza J. L., Eng F. J. Evolution of the dispersed SUC gene family of Saccharomyces by rearrangements of chromosome telomeres. Mol Cell Biol. 1985 Nov;5(11):2894–2902. doi: 10.1128/mcb.5.11.2894. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  5. Chan C. S., Tye B. K. Organization of DNA sequences and replication origins at yeast telomeres. Cell. 1983 Jun;33(2):563–573. doi: 10.1016/0092-8674(83)90437-3. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  6. Chu G., Vollrath D., Davis R. W. Separation of large DNA molecules by contour-clamped homogeneous electric fields. Science. 1986 Dec 19;234(4783):1582–1585. doi: 10.1126/science.3538420. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  7. Doolittle W. F., Sapienza C. Selfish genes, the phenotype paradigm and genome evolution. Nature. 1980 Apr 17;284(5757):601–603. doi: 10.1038/284601a0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  8. Dover G. Molecular drive: a cohesive mode of species evolution. Nature. 1982 Sep 9;299(5879):111–117. doi: 10.1038/299111a0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  9. Dunn B., Szauter P., Pardue M. L., Szostak J. W. Transfer of yeast telomeres to linear plasmids by recombination. Cell. 1984 Nov;39(1):191–201. doi: 10.1016/0092-8674(84)90205-8. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  10. Feinberg A. P., Vogelstein B. A technique for radiolabeling DNA restriction endonuclease fragments to high specific activity. Anal Biochem. 1983 Jul 1;132(1):6–13. doi: 10.1016/0003-2697(83)90418-9. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  11. Fitzgerald-Hayes M., Buhler J. M., Cooper T. G., Carbon J. Isolation and subcloning analysis of functional centromere DNA (CEN11) from Saccharomyces cerevisiae chromosome XI. Mol Cell Biol. 1982 Jan;2(1):82–87. doi: 10.1128/mcb.2.1.82. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  12. Hayashida H., Miyata T. Unusual evolutionary conservation and frequent DNA segment exchange in class I genes of the major histocompatibility complex. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1983 May;80(9):2671–2675. doi: 10.1073/pnas.80.9.2671. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  13. Hieter P., Mann C., Snyder M., Davis R. W. Mitotic stability of yeast chromosomes: a colony color assay that measures nondisjunction and chromosome loss. Cell. 1985 Feb;40(2):381–392. doi: 10.1016/0092-8674(85)90152-7. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  14. Horowitz H., Haber J. E. Identification of autonomously replicating circular subtelomeric Y' elements in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Mol Cell Biol. 1985 Sep;5(9):2369–2380. doi: 10.1128/mcb.5.9.2369. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  15. Horowitz H., Haber J. E. Subtelomeric regions of yeast chromosomes contain a 36 base-pair tandemly repeated sequence. Nucleic Acids Res. 1984 Sep 25;12(18):7105–7121. doi: 10.1093/nar/12.18.7105. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  16. Horowitz H., Thorburn P., Haber J. E. Rearrangements of highly polymorphic regions near telomeres of Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Mol Cell Biol. 1984 Nov;4(11):2509–2517. doi: 10.1128/mcb.4.11.2509. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  17. Iatrou K., Tsitilou S. G., Kafatos F. C. DNA sequence transfer between two high-cysteine chorion gene families in the silkmoth Bombyx mori. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1984 Jul;81(14):4452–4456. doi: 10.1073/pnas.81.14.4452. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  18. Ito H., Fukuda Y., Murata K., Kimura A. Transformation of intact yeast cells treated with alkali cations. J Bacteriol. 1983 Jan;153(1):163–168. doi: 10.1128/jb.153.1.163-168.1983. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  19. Louis E. J., Haber J. E. Mitotic recombination among subtelomeric Y' repeats in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Genetics. 1990 Mar;124(3):547–559. doi: 10.1093/genetics/124.3.547. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  20. McCusker J. H., Haber J. E. Cycloheximide-resistant temperature-sensitive lethal mutations of Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Genetics. 1988 Jun;119(2):303–315. doi: 10.1093/genetics/119.2.303. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  21. Nagylaki T. Evolution of multigene families under interchromosomal gene conversion. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1984 Jun;81(12):3796–3800. doi: 10.1073/pnas.81.12.3796. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  22. Nagylaki T. The evolution of multigene families under intrachromosomal gene conversion. Genetics. 1984 Mar;106(3):529–548. doi: 10.1093/genetics/106.3.529. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  23. Nickoloff J. A., Chen E. Y., Heffron F. A 24-base-pair DNA sequence from the MAT locus stimulates intergenic recombination in yeast. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1986 Oct;83(20):7831–7835. doi: 10.1073/pnas.83.20.7831. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  24. Ohta T. On the evolution of multigene families. Theor Popul Biol. 1983 Apr;23(2):216–240. doi: 10.1016/0040-5809(83)90015-1. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  25. Orgel L. E., Crick F. H. Selfish DNA: the ultimate parasite. Nature. 1980 Apr 17;284(5757):604–607. doi: 10.1038/284604a0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  26. Perlin D. S., Harris S. L., Seto-Young D., Haber J. E. Defective H(+)-ATPase of hygromycin B-resistant pma1 mutants fromSaccharomyces cerevisiae. J Biol Chem. 1989 Dec 25;264(36):21857–21864. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  27. Petes T. D., Hill C. W. Recombination between repeated genes in microorganisms. Annu Rev Genet. 1988;22:147–168. doi: 10.1146/annurev.ge.22.120188.001051. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  28. Petes T. D. Unequal meiotic recombination within tandem arrays of yeast ribosomal DNA genes. Cell. 1980 Mar;19(3):765–774. doi: 10.1016/s0092-8674(80)80052-3. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  29. Rigby P. W., Dieckmann M., Rhodes C., Berg P. Labeling deoxyribonucleic acid to high specific activity in vitro by nick translation with DNA polymerase I. J Mol Biol. 1977 Jun 15;113(1):237–251. doi: 10.1016/0022-2836(77)90052-3. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  30. Selker E. U., Yanofsky C., Driftmier K., Metzenberg R. L., Alzner-DeWeerd B., RajBhandary U. L. Dispersed 5S RNA genes in N. crassa: structure, expression and evolution. Cell. 1981 Jun;24(3):819–828. doi: 10.1016/0092-8674(81)90107-0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  31. Simchen G., Winston F., Styles C. A., Fink G. R. Ty-mediated gene expression of the LYS2 and HIS4 genes of Saccharomyces cerevisiae is controlled by the same SPT genes. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1984 Apr;81(8):2431–2434. doi: 10.1073/pnas.81.8.2431. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  32. Slightom J. L., Blechl A. E., Smithies O. Human fetal G gamma- and A gamma-globin genes: complete nucleotide sequences suggest that DNA can be exchanged between these duplicated genes. Cell. 1980 Oct;21(3):627–638. doi: 10.1016/0092-8674(80)90426-2. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  33. Stewart S. E., Roeder G. S. Transcription by RNA polymerase I stimulates mitotic recombination in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Mol Cell Biol. 1989 Aug;9(8):3464–3472. doi: 10.1128/mcb.9.8.3464. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  34. Szostak J. W., Blackburn E. H. Cloning yeast telomeres on linear plasmid vectors. Cell. 1982 May;29(1):245–255. doi: 10.1016/0092-8674(82)90109-x. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  35. Walmsley R. W., Chan C. S., Tye B. K., Petes T. D. Unusual DNA sequences associated with the ends of yeast chromosomes. Nature. 1984 Jul 12;310(5973):157–160. doi: 10.1038/310157a0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  36. Walsh J. B. Selection and biased gene conversion in a multigene family: consequences of interallelic bias and threshold selection. Genetics. 1986 Mar;112(3):699–716. doi: 10.1093/genetics/112.3.699. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  37. Walsh J. B. Sequence-dependent gene conversion: can duplicated genes diverge fast enough to escape conversion? Genetics. 1987 Nov;117(3):543–557. doi: 10.1093/genetics/117.3.543. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  38. Zakian V. A., Blanton H. M. Distribution of telomere-associated sequences on natural chromosomes in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Mol Cell Biol. 1988 May;8(5):2257–2260. doi: 10.1128/mcb.8.5.2257. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Articles from Genetics are provided here courtesy of Oxford University Press

RESOURCES