CDNA SEQUENCE AND DEDUCED AMINO-ACID-SEQUENCE OF A FUNGAL STRESS PROTEIN-INDUCED IN RHIZOPUS NIGRICANS BY STEROIDS

cDNA clone was isolated from lambda gt11 library prepared from Rhizopu s nigricans after growing the fungus in the presence of progesterone. Northern blot analysis of total RNA showed that expression of correspo nding mRNA was up-regulated in R. nigricans after treatment with diffe rent steroids and after exposure of the fungus to heat shock or osmoti c stress. Sequence analysis revealed an open reading frame for a 364-a mino-acid polypeptide. The predicted amino acid sequence exhibited sig nificant similarity to several sugar epimerases in two domains common to these enzymes. Our results suggest that the analyzed cDNA is coding for a fungal stress inducible protein belonging to sugar epimerases. (C) 1998 Academic Press.