IDENTIFICATION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF HOMOLOGS OF THE EXOCYST COMPONENT SEC10P

The SEC10 gene product is a member of the Exocyst complex essential fo r exocytosis in the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, We report here the cloning and characterization of human Sec10p (hSec10p; GenBan k accession number U85946). hSec10p is a 77-kDa protein with 23% amino acid identity to yeast Sec10p and 37% identity to a C. elegans protei n found in the database. Northern and Western blot analyses indicate t hat hSec10 has a broad tissue distribution, Immunofluorescence stainin g of COS cells cotransfected with hSec10p and a mammalian Sec8p demons trates that these two proteins have an identical distribution in the c ell including a localization in the peripheral cytoplasm, These data s uggest that hSec10p is a component of the mammalian counterpart of the yeast Exocyst complex essential for post-Golgi traffic. (C) 1997 Fede ration of European Biochemical Societies.