A new subfamily of high molecular mass CDC2-related kinases with PITAI/VREmotifs

Kinases of the CDCS family play a key role in cell cycle regulation and gen e expression. In the present work, we identified sea urchin and human cDNAs encoding homologues of a high molecular mass CDC2-like kinase (designated CDC2L5) sharing respectively a PITAVRE and PITAIRE motif. The human cDNA en codes the full-length amino acid sequence of the Cholinesterase-related cel l division controller (CHED) kinase, a previously published partial coding sequence. CDC2L5 overexpressed in mammalian cells is a approximate to 170-k Da nuclear protein, The mRNA is present during the sea urchin early embryog enesis and is ubiquitously expressed in human tissues. (C) 2000 Academic Pr ess.