RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Functional domains in the Deformed protein
JF Development
JO Development
FD The Company of Biologists Limited
SP 1577
OP 1587
VO 122
IS 5
A1 Zhu, A.
A1 Kuziora, M.A.
YR 1996
UL http://dev.biologists.org/content/122/5/1577.abstract
AB A chimeric protein consisting of Deformed with a substituted Abdominal-B homeodomain (Dfd/Abd-B) is used to identify protein domains outside the homeodomain that are required for regulatory activity in vivo. A series of deletion proteins were generated based on regions showing amino acid composition similar to known regulatory domains. Each mutant protein can influence regulation of homeotic genes in a manner distinct from the intact protein. Activity was also tested using promoter elements from empty spiracles and Distal-less, two genes known to be directly regulated by Abdominal-B. Removal of the acidic region and the C-tail region convert the chimera from a strong activator to a repressor of the Distal-less element, but had comparatively little effect on the activation of the empty spiracles element. Constructs without a third domain, the N domain, fail to show any regulatory activity. The N domain is the only domain of the Dfd/Abd-B protein which exhibits significant activation activity when fused to a heterologous DNA binding domain. Our results suggest transcriptional activity of the N domain can be modulated by the acidic and C-tail domains.