摘要：Thymidylate synthase (TS) catalyzes the conversion of deoxyuridylate to thymidylate. Promoter regions of the TS gene from three vertebrates, human, mouse and rat, have been analyzed so far. A unique inverted repeat was present in the promoter region of the human, but not in the mouse and rat, TS genes, and the feature of the promoter region is considerably different between the human TS gene and the two rodent TS genes. To examine whether the characteristics of the human TS gene promoter is intrinsic to human or primate, we cloned a DNA fragment containing the promoter region of the monkey TS gene and determined the nucleotide sequence in this region. The nucleotide sequence in the promoter region of the moneky TS gene was revealed to have 88% homology with that in the corresponding region of the human TS gene. The unique repeted structure mentioned above was also found in the monkey TS gene. Furthermore, the Sp1-binding motif and the CACCC box were found to be conserved in the monkey TS gene. The result of chloramphenicol acetyltransferase assay suggested that the Sp1-binding motif and the CACCC box are essential for the promoter activity of the monkey TS gene, as in the case of the human TS gene.
