Skip to main content
PMC home page
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America logoLink to Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
. 1990 Dec;87(24):9923–9927. doi: 10.1073/pnas.87.24.9923

Mutation in a heterochromatin-specific chromosomal protein is associated with suppression of position-effect variegation in Drosophila melanogaster.

J C Eissenberg 1, T C James 1, D M Foster-Hartnett 1, T Hartnett 1, V Ngan 1, S C Elgin 1
PMCID: PMC55286  PMID: 2124708

Abstract

We report here that a point mutation in the gene which encodes the heterochromatin-specific nonhistone chromosomal protein HP-1 in Drosophila melanogaster is associated with dominant suppression of position-effect variegation. The mutation, a G-to-A transition at the first nucleotide of the last intron, causes missplicing of the HP-1 mRNA. This suggests that heterochromatin-specific proteins play a central role in the gene suppression associated with heterochromatic position effects.

Full text

PDF
9926

Images in this article

9924Image
on p.9924
9925Image
on p.9925
9925Image
on p.9925

Selected References

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

  1. Benton W. D., Davis R. W. Screening lambdagt recombinant clones by hybridization to single plaques in situ. Science. 1977 Apr 8;196(4286):180–182. doi: 10.1126/science.322279. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  2. Brown N. H., Kafatos F. C. Functional cDNA libraries from Drosophila embryos. J Mol Biol. 1988 Sep 20;203(2):425–437. doi: 10.1016/0022-2836(88)90010-1. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  3. Eissenberg J. C., Elgin S. C. Hsp28stl: a P-element insertion mutation that alters the expression of a heat shock gene in Drosophila melanogaster. Genetics. 1987 Feb;115(2):333–340. doi: 10.1093/genetics/115.2.333. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  4. Eissenberg J. C. Position effect variegation in Drosophila: towards a genetics of chromatin assembly. Bioessays. 1989 Jul;11(1):14–17. doi: 10.1002/bies.950110105. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  5. 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]
  6. Green M. R. Pre-mRNA splicing. Annu Rev Genet. 1986;20:671–708. doi: 10.1146/annurev.ge.20.120186.003323. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  7. Hayward G. S., Smith M. G. The chromosome of bacteriophage T5. II. Arrangement of the single-stranded DNA fragments in the T5 + and T5st(O) chromosomes. J Mol Biol. 1972 Feb 14;63(3):397–407. doi: 10.1016/0022-2836(72)90436-6. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  8. Ishii S., Xu Y. H., Stratton R. H., Roe B. A., Merlino G. T., Pastan I. Characterization and sequence of the promoter region of the human epidermal growth factor receptor gene. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1985 Aug;82(15):4920–4924. doi: 10.1073/pnas.82.15.4920. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  9. James T. C., Eissenberg J. C., Craig C., Dietrich V., Hobson A., Elgin S. C. Distribution patterns of HP1, a heterochromatin-associated nonhistone chromosomal protein of Drosophila. Eur J Cell Biol. 1989 Oct;50(1):170–180. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  10. James T. C., Elgin S. C. Identification of a nonhistone chromosomal protein associated with heterochromatin in Drosophila melanogaster and its gene. Mol Cell Biol. 1986 Nov;6(11):3862–3872. doi: 10.1128/mcb.6.11.3862. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  11. Kozak M. The scanning model for translation: an update. J Cell Biol. 1989 Feb;108(2):229–241. doi: 10.1083/jcb.108.2.229. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  12. Lehrach H., Diamond D., Wozney J. M., Boedtker H. RNA molecular weight determinations by gel electrophoresis under denaturing conditions, a critical reexamination. Biochemistry. 1977 Oct 18;16(21):4743–4751. doi: 10.1021/bi00640a033. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  13. Lis J. T., Simon J. A., Sutton C. A. New heat shock puffs and beta-galactosidase activity resulting from transformation of Drosophila with an hsp70-lacZ hybrid gene. Cell. 1983 Dec;35(2 Pt 1):403–410. doi: 10.1016/0092-8674(83)90173-3. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  14. Locke J., Kotarski M. A., Tartof K. D. Dosage-dependent modifiers of position effect variegation in Drosophila and a mass action model that explains their effect. Genetics. 1988 Sep;120(1):181–198. doi: 10.1093/genetics/120.1.181. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  15. Maniatis T., Jeffrey A., Kleid D. G. Nucleotide sequence of the rightward operator of phage lambda. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1975 Mar;72(3):1184–1188. doi: 10.1073/pnas.72.3.1184. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  16. Marvit J., DiLella A. G., Brayton K., Ledley F. D., Robson K. J., Woo S. L. GT to AT transition at a splice donor site causes skipping of the preceding exon in phenylketonuria. Nucleic Acids Res. 1987 Jul 24;15(14):5613–5628. doi: 10.1093/nar/15.14.5613. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  17. Messing J. New M13 vectors for cloning. Methods Enzymol. 1983;101:20–78. doi: 10.1016/0076-6879(83)01005-8. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  18. Meyerowitz E. M., Hogness D. S. Molecular organization of a Drosophila puff site that responds to ecdysone. Cell. 1982 Jan;28(1):165–176. doi: 10.1016/0092-8674(82)90386-5. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  19. Poole S. J., Kauvar L. M., Drees B., Kornberg T. The engrailed locus of Drosophila: structural analysis of an embryonic transcript. Cell. 1985 Jan;40(1):37–43. doi: 10.1016/0092-8674(85)90306-x. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  20. Reuter G., Giarre M., Farah J., Gausz J., Spierer A., Spierer P. Dependence of position-effect variegation in Drosophila on dose of a gene encoding an unusual zinc-finger protein. Nature. 1990 Mar 15;344(6263):219–223. doi: 10.1038/344219a0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  21. Reuter G., Werner W., Hoffmann H. J. Mutants affecting position-effect heterochromatinization in Drosophila melanogaster. Chromosoma. 1982;85(4):539–551. doi: 10.1007/BF00327349. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  22. Reuter G., Wolff I. Isolation of dominant suppressor mutations for position-effect variegation in Drosophila melanogaster. Mol Gen Genet. 1981;182(3):516–519. doi: 10.1007/BF00293947. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  23. Reynolds G. A., Basu S. K., Osborne T. F., Chin D. J., Gil G., Brown M. S., Goldstein J. L., Luskey K. L. HMG CoA reductase: a negatively regulated gene with unusual promoter and 5' untranslated regions. Cell. 1984 Aug;38(1):275–285. doi: 10.1016/0092-8674(84)90549-x. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  24. Saiki R. K., Gelfand D. H., Stoffel S., Scharf S. J., Higuchi R., Horn G. T., Mullis K. B., Erlich H. A. Primer-directed enzymatic amplification of DNA with a thermostable DNA polymerase. Science. 1988 Jan 29;239(4839):487–491. doi: 10.1126/science.2448875. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  25. Sanger F., Nicklen S., Coulson A. R. DNA sequencing with chain-terminating inhibitors. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1977 Dec;74(12):5463–5467. doi: 10.1073/pnas.74.12.5463. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  26. Tartof K. D., Bishop C., Jones M., Hobbs C. A., Locke J. Towards an understanding of position effect variegation. Dev Genet. 1989;10(3):162–176. doi: 10.1002/dvg.1020100306. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  27. Treisman R., Proudfoot N. J., Shander M., Maniatis T. A single-base change at a splice site in a beta 0-thalassemic gene causes abnormal RNA splicing. Cell. 1982 Jul;29(3):903–911. doi: 10.1016/0092-8674(82)90452-4. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  28. Wahl G. M., Stern M., Stark G. R. Efficient transfer of large DNA fragments from agarose gels to diazobenzyloxymethyl-paper and rapid hybridization by using dextran sulfate. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1979 Aug;76(8):3683–3687. doi: 10.1073/pnas.76.8.3683. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  29. Wustmann G., Szidonya J., Taubert H., Reuter G. The genetics of position-effect variegation modifying loci in Drosophila melanogaster. Mol Gen Genet. 1989 Jun;217(2-3):520–527. doi: 10.1007/BF02464926. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Articles from Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America are provided here courtesy of National Academy of Sciences

RESOURCES