Overexpression of SIS2 Increases the Expression of SW4, CLNl and CLN2 in sit4 mutants

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Copyright 0 1995 by the Genetics Society of America

Overexpression of SIS2, Which Contains an Extremely Acidic Region, Increases the Expression of SW4, CLNl and CLN2 in sit4 mutants Charles J. Di Como,*'tRon Bose"" and Kim T. Amdt" *Cold Spring Harbor LaboratoT, Cold Spring Harbor, New York 11 724-2212 and tGraduate Program in Genetics, State University of New York, Stony Brook, New York 11 794

Manuscript received July 5 , 1994 Accepted for publication September 26, 1994 ABSTRACT The Saccharomyces cermisiaeSZS2 gene was identified by its ability, when present ona high copy number plasmid, to increase dramatically the growth rate of sit4 mutants. SIT4 encodes a type 2A-related protein phosphatase that is required in late G1 for normal G1 cyclin expression and for bud initiation. Overexpression of SIS2, which contains an extremely acidic carboxyl terminal region, stimulated the rate of C L N I , C W 2 , SWI4 and CLB5 expression in sit4 mutants. Also, overexpression of SIS2 in a CLNl cln2 cln3 strain stimulated the growth rate and the rate of C L N l and CLB5 RNA accumulation during late G1. The SIS2 protein fractionated with nuclei and was released from the nuclear fraction by treatment with either DNase I or micrococcal nuclease, but notby RNase A. This result, combined with the finding that overexpression of SIS2 is extremely toxic to a strain containing lower than normal levels of histones H2A and H2B, suggests that SIS2 might function to stimulate transcription via an interaction with chromatin.

T

HE Saccharomyces cermisiae SIT4 gene encodes proa

tein with homology to the catalytic subunit of mammalian type 1 and type 2A serine/threonine protein phosphatases (ARNDT et al. 1989).All known conditional sit4 strains arrest as unbudded cells in the G1 phase of the cell cycle (SUTTON et al. 1991). Moreover, cultures ofslow-growing sit4 mutantsare highly enriched in unbudded cells. SIT4 is required for the execution of Start, which is the commitment point for entry into the cell division cycle. The requirement for SIT4 for the execution of Start is due to the requirement for SIT4 for the normal expression of the CLNl and CLN2 G1 cyclin genes (FERNANDEZ-SARABIA et al. 1992). The RNA levels of CLNl and CLN2 increase dramatically during late G1 and then decrease during S phase. A critical level of G1 cyclin activity is required for the execution of Start (CROSS and TINKELENBERG 1991;DIRICK and NASMWH 1991). However, very little is known about the mechanisms that regulate the expression of the CLNl and CLNZ genes during late G1. Both CLN function(either CLNl,CLN2 or CLN3) and CDC28 function (which encodes the catalytic subunit of a protein kinase that interacts withCLN proteins) are required for CLNl and CLN2 expression during late G1 (CROSSand TINKELENBERG 1991; DIRICKand NASMWH 1991).The transcription of CLNl and CLNZis activated, at least in part, bySWI4 and SWIG, which bind as a complex to sites in the CLNl and C W 2 promoters Corresponding author: Kim T. Amdt, Cold Spring Harbor LaboraP.O. Box 100, Cold Spring Harbor, NY 11724-2212. Present address: Graduate Program, Rockefeller University, 600

tory,

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York Ave., New York, NY 10021. Genetics 1 3 9 95-107 (January, 3995)

(OGASet al. 1991). S W 4 RNA itself undergoes a 10-fold cell cycle-dependent variation in levels (BREEDEN and MIKESELL1991) where the S W 4 RNA levelspeak at or just before those of CLNl and CLNZ (FERNANDEZSARABIA et al. 1992). The normal expression of S W 4 may require MCB promoter elements (MluI cell cycle box elements), which alsoare containedin the promoters of many genes required for DNA synthesis (FOSTER et al. 1993). The major in vitro binding activity to MCB elements is due to a MBPl/SWIGcontaining complex (KOCHet al. 1993). The requirement for SIT4 for CLNl and CLN2 expression is at least partly due to the requirement for SZT4 for the accumulation of S W 4 RNA during late G1 (FERNANDEZ-SARABIA et al. 1992). In addition to the role of SIT4 in CLNl and CLN2 expression, SIT4 also is required for another late G1 process. If CLN2 is expressed at low levels from a SZT4 independentpromoter,the cells can replicate their DNA in the absence of SIT4 function (FERNANDEZ-SARABIA et al. 1992). However, the cells still are blocked for bud initiation. Additional evidence for a role of SIT4 for bud initiation is that sit4 mutations are synthetically lethal in combination with a bem2 mutation (K. T. ARNDT, unpublished results). The BEM2 gene encodes a protein with similarity to Rho GTPase activating proteins and seems to function for bud emergence (BENDER and PRINGLE 1991; ZHENC et al. 1993). Where could SIT4 function in the budding process? Once a visible bud has formed, SIT4 is no longer required until late G1 of the next cell cycle. Therefore, although bud initiation requires SIT4, SIT4 is not required for continuedgrowth of the bud.LEWand REED (1993) haveshown that polarization of cortical actin


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