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GENETICS, GENOMICS, AND MOLECULAR EVOLUTION

Molecular Characterization and Phylogeny of U2AF³⁵ Homologs in Plants^1,[W],[OA]

Department of Genetics, Development and Cell Biology (B.B.-W., V.B.) and Department of Statistics (V.B.), Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa 50010

U2AF (U2 small nuclear ribonucleoprotein auxiliary factor) is an essential splicing factor with critical roles in recognition of the 3'-splice site. In animals, the U2AF small subunit (U2AF³⁵) can bind to the 3'-AG intron border and promote U2 small nuclear RNP binding to the branch-point sequences of introns through interaction with the U2AF large subunit. Two copies of U2AF³⁵-encoding genes were identified in Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana; atU2AF³⁵a and atU2AF³⁵b). Both are expressed in all tissues inspected, with atU2AF³⁵a expressed at a higher level than atU2AF³⁵b in most tissues. Differences in the expression patterns of atU2AF³⁵a and atU2AF³⁵b in roots were revealed by a promoter::-glucuronidase assay, with atU2AF³⁵b expressed strongly in whole young roots and root tips and atU2AF³⁵a limited to root vascular regions. Altered expression levels of atU2AF³⁵a or atU2AF³⁵b cause pleiotropic phenotypes (including flowering time, leaf morphology, and flower and silique shape). Novel slicing isoforms were generated from FCA pre-mRNA by splicing of noncanonical introns in plants with altered expression levels of atU2AF³⁵. U2AF³⁵ homologs were also identified from maize (Zea mays) and other plants with large-scale expressed sequence tag projects. A C-terminal motif (named SERE) is highly conserved in all seed plant protein homologs, suggesting it may have an important function specific to higher plants.

The author responsible for distribution of materials integral to the findings presented in this article in accordance with the policy described in the Instructions for Authors (www.plantphysiol.org) is: Volker Brendel (vbrendel{at}iastate.edu).

^[W] The online version of this article contains Web-only data.

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Article, publication date, and citation information can be found at www.plantphysiol.org/cgi/doi/10.1104/pp.105.073858.

^* Corresponding author; e-mail vbrendel{at}iastate.edu; fax 515–294–6755.

Received November 7, 2005; returned for revision November 7, 2005; accepted November 26, 2005.

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