S. Wnendt et al., MOLECULAR-CLONING, SEQUENCE-ANALYSIS AND EXPRESSION OF THE GENE ENCODING AN ANTIFUNGAL-PROTEIN FROM ASPERGILLUS-GIGANTEUS, Current genetics, 25(6), 1994, pp. 519-523
The gene encoding the precursor of a small secretory protein with anti
fungal activity was isolated from A. giganteus and characterized by re
striction, mapping, hybridization and nucleotide sequencing. The promo
ter contains a typical TATA-box at a distance of 135 bp upstream of th
e open reading frame. The open reading frame is interrupted by two sma
ll introns with conserved splice sites. The precursor of the antifunga
l protein (AFP) consists of 94 amino acids and appears to be processed
to the mature AFP of 51 amino acids by a two-step process. Transfer o
f the gene into A. niger yielded only transformants with a very low ex
pression level, probably because high-expression transformants were co
unterselected by the antifungal activity of the recombinant protein.