Proteins from nuclear extracts of two lepidopteran cell lines recognize the ends of TTAA-specific transposons piggyBac and tagalong

The transposons piggyBac and tagalong are Lepidopteran transposons that exh ibit extreme site-specificity for the tetranucleotide TTAA upon insertion a nd excise in a characteristic precise fashion, regenerating a single TTAA t arget site. The precise excision of both piggyBac and tagalong can occur in the absence of factors encoded by either transposon, possibly through the recruitment of host proteins and/or cross-mobilizing transposons. In this r eport, we utilize mobility shift assays and exonuclease III protection anal yses to identify DNA binding activities from IPLB-SF21AE and TN-368 cells t hat are specific for piggyBac and tagalong-terminal repeats.