Skip to main content
Log in

Molecular analysis of mutants of the Neurospora adenylosuccinate synthetase locus

  • Research Article
  • Published:
Journal of Genetics Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

The ad-8 gene of Neurospora crassa, in addition to being used for the study of purine biology, has been extensively studied as a model for gene structure, mutagenesis and intralocus recombination. Because of this there is an extensive collection of well-characterized N. crassa ad-8 mutants in the Fungal Genetics Stock Center collection. Among these are spontaneous mutants and mutants induced with X-ray, UV or chemical mutagens. The specific lesions in these mutants have been genetically mapped at high resolution. We have sequenced the ad-8 locus from 13 of these mutants and identified the molecular nature of the mutation in each strain. We compare the historical fine-structure map to the DNA and amino acid sequence of each allele. The placement of the individual lesions in the fine-structure map was more accurate at the 5′ end of the gene and no mutants were identified in the 3′ untranslated region of this gene. We additionally analysed ad-8  +  alleles in 18 N. crassa strains subjected to whole-genome sequence analysis and describe the variability among Neurospora strains and among fungi and other organisms.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Figure 1
Figure 2

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Altschul S. F., Madden T. L., Schaffer A. A., Zhang J., Zhang Z., Miller W. and Lipman D. J. 1997 Gapped BLAST and PSI-BLAST: a new generation of protein database search programs. Nucleic Acids Res. 25, 3389–3402.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Baggott J. E., Gorman G. S. and Morgan S. L. 2011 Phenotypes and circadian rhythm in utilization of formate in purine nucleotide biosynthesis de novo in adult humans. Life Sci. 88, 688–692.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Batova A., Diccianni M. B., Omura-Minamisawa M., Yu J., Carrera C. J., Bridgeman L. J. et al. 1999 Use of alanosine as a methylthioadenosine phosphorylase-selective therapy for T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia in vitro. Cancer Res. 59, 1492–1497.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Dean R. A., Talbot N. J., Ebbole D. J., Farman M. L., Mitchell T. K., Orbach M. J. et al. 2005 The genome sequence of the rice blast fungus Magnaporthe grisea. Nature 434, 980–986.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • de Serres F. J. and Webber B. B. 1997 Quantitative and qualitative comparisons of spontaneous and radiation-induced specific-locus mutation in the ad-3 region of heterokaryon 12 of Neurospora crassa. Mutat. Res. 375, 37–52.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • de Serres F. J., Malling H. V., Brockman H. E. and Ong T. M. 1997 Quantitative and qualitative comparison of spontaneous and chemical-induced specific-locus mutation in the ad-3 region of heterokaryon 12 of Neurospora crassa. Mutat. Res. 375, 53–72.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Diaz-Sanchez V., Estrada A. F., Trautmann D., Limon M. C., Al-Babili S. and Avalos J. 2011 Analysis of al-2 mutations in Neurospora. PLoS ONE 6, e21948.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Dorfman B. Z. 1969 The isolation of adenylosuccinate synthetase mutants in yeast by selection for constitutive behavior in pigmented strains. Genetics 61, 377–389.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Ellison C. E., Stajich J. E., Jacobson D. J., Natvig D. O., Lapidus A., Foster B. et al. 2011 Massive changes in genome architecture accompany the transition to self-fertility in the filamentous fungus Neurospora tetrasperma. Genetics 189, 55–69.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Espagne E., Lespinet O., Malagnac F., Da Silva C., Jaillon O., Porcel B. M. et al. 2008 The genome sequence of the model ascomycete fungus Podospora anserina. Genome Biol. 9, R77.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Galagan J. E., Calvo S. E., Borkovich K. A., Selker E. U., Read N. D., Jaffe D. et al. 2003 The genome sequence of the filamentous fungus Neurospora crassa. Nature 422, 859–868.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Galagan J. E., Calvo S. E., Cuomo C., Ma L. J., Wortman J. R., Batzoglou S. et al. 2005 Sequencing of Aspergillus nidulans and comparative analysis with A. fumigatus and A. oryzae. Nature 438, 1105–1115.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Garnett M. J., Edelman E. J., Heidorn S. J., Greenman C. D., Dastur A., Lau K. W. et al. 2012 Systematic identification of genomic markers of drug sensitivity in cancer cells. Nature 483, 570–575.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gross S. R. and Tatum E. L. 1956 Physiological aspects of genetics. Annu. Rev. Physiol. 18, 53–68.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Ishikawa T. 1962a Genetic studies of ad-8 mutants in Neurospora crassa. I. Genetic fine structure of the ad-8 locus. Genetics 47, 1147–1161.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Ishikawa T. 1962b Genetic studies of ad-8 mutants in Neurospora crassa. II. Interallelic complementation at the ad-8 locus. Genetics 47, 1755–1770.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Ishikawa T. 1965 A molecular model for an enzyme based on the genetic and complementation analyses at the Ad-8 locus in Neurospora. J. Mol. Biol. 13, 586–591.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Johnson N. G. and Giles N. H. 1956 Genetic studies of adenineless mutants in Neurospora crassa. Microbial. Genet. Bull. 13, 15–16.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kamper J., Kahmann R., Bolker M., Ma L. J., Brefort T., Saville B. J. et al. 2006 Insights from the genome of the biotrophic fungal plant pathogen Ustilago maydis. Nature 444, 97–101.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Levine R. A. and Taylor M. W. 1982 Mechanism of adenine toxicity in Escherichia coli. J. Bacteriol. 149, 923–930.

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Ma L. J., van der Does H. C., Borkovich K. A., Coleman J. J., Daboussi M. J., Di Pietro A. et al. 2010 Comparative genomics reveals mobile pathogenicity chromosomes in Fusarium. Nature 464, 367–373.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Martinez D., Berka R. M., Henrissat B., Saloheimo M., Arvas M., Baker S. E. et al. 2008 Genome sequencing and analysis of the biomass-degrading fungus Trichoderma reesei (syn. Hypocrea jecorina). Nat. Biotechnol. 26, 553–560.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • McCluskey K., Wiest A., Grigoriev I. V., Lipzen A., Martin J., Schackwitz W. and Baker S. E. 2011 Rediscovery by whole genome sequencing: classical mutations and genome polymorphisms in Neurospora crassa. G3: Genes, Genomes, Genetics 1, 303–316

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Miller J. C. 2010 Adenylosuccinate synthetase 1: a novel target of deletion in lung adenocarcinoma with implications for metabolic stress tolerance. A dissertation in pharmacology. Ph.D. thesis, The Pennsylvania State University, Hershey, USA.

  • Miller J. C., Blake Jr D. C. and Herzog C. R. 2009 Adenylosuccinate synthetase 1 gene is a novel target of deletion in lung adenocarcinoma. Mol. Carcinog. 48, 1116–1122.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Nowrousian M., Stajich J. E., Chu M., Engh I., Espagne E., Halliday K. et al. 2010 De novo assembly of a 40 Mb eukaryotic genome from short sequence reads: Sordaria macrospora, a model organism for fungal morphogenesis. PLoS Genet. 6, e1000891.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Ribard C., Scazzocchio C. and Oestreicher N. 2001 The oxpA5 mutation of Aspergillus nidulans is an allele of adB, the gene encoding adenylosuccinate synthetase. Mol. Genet. Genomics 266, 701–710.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Stajich J. E., Wilke S. K., Ahren D., Au C. H., Birren B. W., Borodovsky M. et al. 2010 Insights into evolution of multicellular fungi from the assembled chromosomes of the mushroom Coprinopsis cinerea (Coprinus cinereus). Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 107, 11889–11894.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Wang W., Hou Z., Honzatko R. B. and Fromm H. J. 1997 Relationship of conserved residues in the IMP binding site to substrate recognition and catalysis in Escherichia coli adenylosuccinate synthetase. J. Biol. Chem. 272, 16911–16916.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Westergaard M. 1957 Chemical mutagenesis in relation to the concept of the gene. Experientia 13, 224–234.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

The FGSC is supported by grant 0742713 from the US National Science Foundation. The authors wish to thank Dr D. Kasbekar for his pre-submission comments on the text.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to K. McCLUSKEY.

Additional information

[Wiest A., McCarthy A. J., Schnittker R., and McCluskey K. 2012 Molecular analysis of mutants of the Neurospora adenylosuccinate synthetase locus. J. Genet. xx, xx–xx]

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

WIEST, A., McCARTHY, A.J., SCHNITTKER, R. et al. Molecular analysis of mutants of the Neurospora adenylosuccinate synthetase locus. J Genet 91, 199–204 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12041-012-0175-1

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12041-012-0175-1

Keywords

Navigation