NR AEOR
AU Gilch,S.; Spielhaupter,C.; Schätzl,H.M.
TI Shortest known prion protein allele in highly BSE-susceptible lemurs
QU Biological Chemistry 2000 May-Jun; 381(5-6): 521-3
PT journal article
AB We describe the shortest prion protein allele known to date. Surprisingly, it is found as a polymorphism exactly in a species (prosimian lemurs) which seems highly susceptible to oral infection with BSE-derived prions. The truncation of the prion protein we found raises several questions. First, is the truncated octarepeat structure we describe, consisting of two octarepeats, still functional in copper binding? A second question is whether this truncation is related to the remarkable oral infectibility of lemurs with BSE-derived prions. And finally, one could argue that this genotype alone might favour development of a prion disease, even in the absence of exogenous infection.
IN Die Autoren generierten PCR-Fragmente von Teilen der kodierenden Regionen (den Aminosäuren 27-192 des menschlichen PrPc entsprechend) der Prionproteingene des Schwarzweißen Vari (Varecia variegata variegata, engl. Ruffed lemur) und des Mohrenmaki (Lemur macaco, engl. Black lemur). Die doppelsträngigen DNA-Fragmente klonierten sie in einen nicht genannten Vektor und sequenzierten sie. In beiden Spezies fanden sie einen Polymorphismus. Während ein Allel die bei Säugetieren üblichen 5 Wiederholungen des Oktapeptids aufwies, besaß das andere nur zwei.
MH *Alleles; Amino Acid Sequence; Animal; Human; Lemur/*genetics; Molecular Sequence Data; Prions/*genetics; Sequence Homology, Amino Acid; Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
AD Genecenter Munich, Max von Pettenkofer-Institute for Virology, Ludwig-Maximilians-University of Munich, Germany.
SP englisch
PO Deutschland