CHARACTERIZATION OF THE GENES ENCODING CARBONIC ANHYDRASE-I OF CHIMPANZEE AND GORILLA - COMPARATIVE-ANALYSIS OF 5' FLANKING ERYTHROID-SPECIFIC PROMOTER SEQUENCES

The genes encoding carbonic anhydrase I (CA I) have been characterized for chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) and gorilla (Gorilla gorilla). In ad dition, 44 nucleotides (nt) at the 5' end of the noncoding first exon (exon 1a), which is unique to the erythroid CA I mRNA, together with 1 88 nt of the adjacent 5'flanking regions, were sequenced for the corre sponding positions of the CA I of orangutan, pigtail macaque, and squi rrel monkey. When these 5'flanking regions are compared, along with th ose published for human and mouse CA I, they were found to contain sev eral conserved sequences that may bind factors involved in the erythro id-specific expression of CA I. Comparisons of the human, chimpanzee, and gorilla coding and noncoding CA I sequences do not significantly d eviate from a pattern of trichotomy for the evolutionary origins of th ese three hominoid species.