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. 1994 Jun;14(6):4155–4159. doi: 10.1128/mcb.14.6.4155

Functional substitution of an essential yeast RNA polymerase subunit by a highly conserved mammalian counterpart.

K McKune 1, N A Woychik 1
PMCID: PMC358781  PMID: 8196653

Abstract

We isolated the cDNA encoding the homolog of the Saccharomyces cerevisiae nuclear RNA polymerase common subunit RPB6 from hamster CHO cells. Alignment of yeast RPB6 with its mammalian counterpart revealed that the subunits have nearly identical carboxy-terminal halves and a short acidic region at the amino terminus. Remarkably, the length and amino acid sequence of the hamster RPB6 are identical to those of the human RPB6 subunit. The conservation in sequence from lower to higher eukaryotes also reflects conservation of function in vivo, since hamster RPB6 supports normal wild-type yeast cell growth in the absence of the essential gene encoding RPB6.

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Selected References

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