A plasmodial alpha-tubulin cDNA from Physarum polycephalum. Nucleotide sequence and comparative analysis

As the first step towards correlating structure and function of tubulin in the slime mold Physarum polycephalum we have elucidated the nucleotide sequence of a cDNA that appears to code for all but the last 25 to 30 C-terminal amino acids of a plasmodial alpha-tubulin. Differences in amino acid sequence from those of other alpha-tubulins are distributed fairly evenly throughout the sequence, although a relatively extensive conserved region is found in position 396 to 426 near the C terminus. A small region in position 298 to 307 contains a cluster of amino acid residues unique to Physarum alpha-tubulin. The sequence is 70% homologous to two yeast alpha-tubulins and about 83% homologous to five animal alpha-tubulins. A comparison of the homologies of all the known alpha-tubulins indicates that a large decrease in the accepted point mutation rate has occurred during the evolution of the metazoa, suggesting a major functional specialization of microtubules.

Structural differences between brain beta 1- and beta 2-tubulins: implications for microtubule assembly and colchicine binding

Brain beta 1- and beta 2-tubulins are the major and minor beta-tubulin components of chordate brain tissue, respectively. Two cysteines of beta 1, but not beta 2, can be specifically cross-linked with the bifunctional sulfhydryl reagent N,N'-ethylenebis(iodoacetamide) (EBI). They are in positions 239 and 354. Although separated by 115 amino acid residues along the beta 1-chain, the two sulfur atoms are maximally 9 A apart in the beta 1 tertiary structure. The failure of beta 2 to form a similar cross-bridge is due to the absence of a cysteine in position 239. At least 10 other sequence differences are also present between beta 1 and beta 2. Positions 239 and 354 of beta 1 probably occupy a key part of the tubulin molecule. The microtubule assembly inhibitors colchicine and podophyllotoxin appear to bind on or near this site and EBI is a potent inhibitor of microtubule assembly. Furthermore, the beta 1-cysteine in position 239 appears to be the most reactive in brain tubulin under the given conditions. The marked difference between beta 1 and beta 2 in this critical region suggests that they may have different functions in brain tissue.

An evaluation of tubulin as a molecular clock

The available sequence data for tubulin indicates that it cannot be used as a molecular clock. Apparent alpha-tubulin mutation rates, for example, vary from 0.16 to 3.8 PAMs per 100 million years depending on which two alpha-tubulins are compared. All animal alpha-tubulin mutation rates seem to be quite low, whereas those of non-animals are relatively high. A similar division is not present amongst the beta-tubulins; their apparent mutation rates, however, vary just as much. For any given tubulin, the largest number of amino acid sequence differences are obtained when comparing it to the tubulins of yeasts. Sequence comparisons with the tubulins of unicellular algae and chelates show far fewer differences. Cytochrome c data, however, show that the ciliates diverged from animals well before the yeasts. This means, therefore, that the average tubulin mutation rates in yeasts and ciliates since the time they shared a common ancestor must be quite different. The high mutation rate of yeast tubulins may possibly reflect the absence of cilia. Structural constraints imposed on tubulin by the large number of interactions with other components of the complex ciliary axoneme probably have a significant effect on its rate of mutation.

Significance of X granules in histiocytosis X: an ultrastructural study

Histiocytosis X is characterized by the presence of cytoplasmic rod structures called Langerhans' cell granules or X granules (XG). It has been speculated that histiocytosis X is a Langerhans' cell disorder. This ultrastructural study was performed to quantitate the number of XG containing histiocytes in the histiocytosis X lesions. Twenty-four specimens from 22 patients with histiocytosis X were studied: 4 from skin, 5 from lymph node, 11 from bone, 2 from lung, 1 from gingiva, and 1 from cheek. The majority of the histiocytes in histiocytosis X lesions do not contain X granules. The majority of the histiocytes in histiocytosis X lesions do not contain X granules. The percentage of histiocytes with XG in a lesion has no relation to the age of the patient or the organ from which it was obtained, except for skin, where they were quite numerous. The relative percent-age of histiocytes with granules does not correlate significantly with the prognosis of these patients.

Quantitative determination, isolation and characterization of pig lung tubulin

Tubulin from pig lung was quantitatively determined, isolated and characterized. It accounted for about 0.3-0.4% of the total soluble protein of pig lung, as measured by colchicine binding or radioimmunoassay. Purified tubulin was obtained by several cycles of polymerization and depolymerization in the presence of dimethyl sulphoxide and 2H2O as stabilizing agents. The proteolytic cleavage patterns of the lung tubulin subunits closely resembled those of other mammalian cytoplasmic tubulin subunits, such as those of brain and kidney. However, the pattern of lung isotubulins on isoelectric focusing differed substantially from that of brain isotubulins . These differences did not appear to be the result of major lung tubulin post-translational modifications, since approximately the same pattern of isotubulins was found for the tubulin synthesized by lung poly(A)-containing mRNA in a reticulocyte system in vitro.

The tubulins of animals, plants, fungi and protists implications for metazoan evolution

alpha-Tubulin subunits from trout (S. gairdneri) sperm tails, sea urchin (S. purpuratus) cilia, protistan alga (C. elongatum ) flagella and rose (Paul's Scarlet) cytoplasm have been characterized by limited proteolytic cleavage with the enzyme Staphylococcus aureus protease and electrophoresis of the digestion products on SDS-PAGE. The resulting patterns corresponded to either of two major types representative of animal and non-animal alpha-tubulins, respectively. A total of 28 alpha-tubulins have now been characterized by this method. They are classified in this paper according to the type of cleavage pattern generated by the enzyme S. aureus protease. The implications of these results for metazoan evolution are discussed.

Role of the intensive care ambulance in the transport of accident victims

The performance of intensive care ambulance officers (paramedics) has been assessed by an analysis of interventions and outcomes in 75 patients transported by ambulance services to the Westmead Centre following accidents. An injury severity score has been used to compare anticipated with actual results. It appeared that some 20% of patients benefited from paramedical interventions, that some 10% reached hospital alive because of the interventions, and that about 3% survived in the long term because of the interventions. Ambulance officers showed themselves to be accurate in assessing the severity of trauma.

Pig sperm tail tubulin. Its extraction and characterization

Axonemal tubulin extracted from pig sperm tails has been characterized by one- and two-dimensional electrophoresis and by one-dimensional peptide mapping. The electrophoretic mobilities of its subunits after reduction and carboxymethylation were similar to those of the major subunits of pig brain tubulin. Sperm tail tubulin subunits also had roughly the same isoelectric points as pig brain tubulin subunits, except that they appeared to have a relatively larger tailing effect. The proteolytic cleavage pattern of the pig sperm tail beta-tubulin closely resembled those of both the tunicate (Ciona intestinalis) sperm beta-tubulin and pig brain beta-tubulin. The peptide pattern of pig sperm tail alpha-tubulin, however, was more similar to that of tunicate sperm tail alpha-tubulin than to that of pig brain alpha-tubulin. This supports the hypothesis put forward in a previous investigation [1] that functionally similar tubulins from taxonomically distant species can be more related than functionally dissimilar tubulins from the same species.

Identification and characterization of axopodial tubulins from Echinosphaerium nucleofilum

Isolated microtubule protein from axopodia of the heliozoan Echinosphaerium nucleofilum, consisting of two major bands on SDS-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE), has been compared to axonemal and cytoplasmic tubulins from both animal and non-animal sources. The upper E. nucleofilum protein band migrated faster than the alpha-tubulins of bovine brain and sea anemone sperm tails but with approximately the same electrophoretic mobility as the axonemal alpha-tubulins of Tetrahymena pyriformis and the alga Chlorogonium elongatum and cytoplasmic alpha-tubulin from the slime mold Physarum polycephalum. The lower E. nucleofilum protein band, however, had a higher electrophoretic mobility than all the beta-tubulins which we have so far examined. It was, nevertheless, a true beta-tubulin as shown by its migration on two-dimensional gel electrophoresis and the general resemblance of its one- and two-dimensional peptide maps to those of other beta-tubulins. The Staphylococcus aureus protease cleavage pattern of the upper axopodial protein band was similar to those of other non-animal alpha-tubulins but quite different from those of the animal alpha-tubulins. In contrast, the two-dimensional tryptic peptide map of axopodial alpha-tubulin was distinct from all of them. For example, a characteristic constellation of peptides common to the peptide maps of the other alpha-tubulins was absent from that of E. nucleofilum. In contrast to Physarum and metazoan tubulins but similar to Tetrahymena tubulin, the axopodial alpha-tubulin had a more basic isoelectric point than the beta-subunit as shown by two dimensional gel electrophoresis. Some of the unusual characteristics of E. nucleofilum axopodial tubulin may not only reflect phylogenetic variation, but also the different functional requirements of axopodial microtubules.

Tubulin amino acid sequence and consequences

The 451 residues of alpha-tubulin from pig brain and the 445 residues of the beta-subunit display 41% sequence identity. Although the primary structure is highly conserved during evolution, several positions in each of the chains are heterogeneous, indicating four alpha-variants and two of the beta-polypeptide. Both C-terminal parts are highly acidic. Small regions can be correlated to sequences of nucleotide binding proteins. Cysteine beta 201 may be involved in the colchicine binding site.

beta 2-Tubulin, a form of chordate brain tubulin with lesser reactivity toward an assembly-inhibiting sulfhydryl-directed cross-linking reagent

Beta 1 and beta 2 are the designations given to two forms of beta-tubulin that have different electrophoretic mobilities on discontinuous polyacrylamide gels in the presence of sodium dodecyl sulfate [Little, M. (1979) FEBS Lett. 108, 283-286]. Beta 1 and beta 2 constitute respectively 75% and 25% of the total beta-tubulin in bovine brain. Although beta 1 appears to be ubiquitous in animals, beta 2 has so far only been found in the brains of cows, pigs, deer, rats, chicks, and dogfish but not in squid brain. Beta 2 is not found in bovine kidneys, in porcine lungs, or in any nonchordate tubulin that has been examined. When tubulin is reacted with the sulfhydryl-directed reagent N,-N'-ethylenebis(iodoacetamide) (EBI), beta 1, but not beta 2, is converted to a faster moving form, beta. The yield of beta 2 in this reaction is not altered by the presence of drugs. When [14C]EBI is used as a probe, most of the label is incorporated into beta 1 rather than beta 2. Tubulin molecules that have reacted with EBI to form beta are much less likely to polymerize into microtubules than are molecules that have not formed beta. In view of the observation that only beta 1, and not beta 2, can form beta, it is possible that beta 1 represents a form of tubulin whose assembly may be regulated by a mechanism involving sulfhydryls. In contrast, beta 2 may represent a form of tubulin whose assembly is regulated by some other mechanism.

The challengers, interactors and mainstreamers: second step education and nursing roles

What impact have post-licensure or "Second Step" programs for nurses had been upon experienced nurses? How successful have they been in developing more professional orientations among nurses trained for a technical role? A factor analysis of longitudinal data from 236 nursing students in six Second Step programs revealed that students entering these programs varied greatly in professional attitudes. Three types of students--the challengers, the interactors, and the mainstreamers were differentiated, by their contrasting nursing styles as well as by diverse sociopolitical views and personality characteristics. Data indicated that, at graduation, students in all three groups perceived themselves as more professionally involved, committed, and competent, but they did not change similarly in other areas of life. The challengers and the interactors made significant changes in their sociopolitical views and in some personality characteristics, while the mainstreamers made fewer changes and maintained greater consistency from entry to graduation. Second Step education promoted professional development, but its impact upon other areas of life varied, depending upon the students' receptivity and readiness for change.

Complete amino acid sequence of beta-tubulin from porcine brain

The primary structure of porcine brain beta-tubulin was determined by automated and manual Edman degradation of six sets of overlapping peptides. The protein consists of 445 amino acid residues and has a minimum of six positions that are heterogeneous, indicating at least two beta-tubulins in porcine brain. Comparison of the optimally aligned sequences of alpha-tubulin and beta-tubulin indicates that 41% of their primary structures are identical. A region rich in glycyl residues is similar both in sequence and predicted secondary structure to the phosphate binding loop of several nucleotide binding enzymes. beta-Tubulin contains a highly acidic COOH-terminal region that resembles the NH2-terminus of troponin T.

Complete amino acid sequence of alpha-tubulin from porcine brain

The amino acid sequence of alpha-tubulin from porcine brain was determined by automated and manual Edman degradation of eight sets of overlapping peptides. It comprises 450 residues plus a COOH-terminal tyrosine that is present only in 15% of the material. A region of 40 residues at the COOH-terminus is highly acidic, mainly due to 16 glutamyl residues. This high concentration of negative charge suggests a region for binding cations. At least six positions, most of them around position 270, are occupied by two amino acid residues each. Several of these exchange sites were assigned to specific peptides by analysis of the purified corresponding fragments. These data indicate four alpha-tubulins in porcine brain. Although alpha-tubulin on the whole is unrelated to other proteins, there are regions that can be correlated to sequences of the myosin head, to actin, to tropomyosin, and to troponins C and T.

Comparative structure and chemistry of tubulins from different eukaryotes

Electrophoretic and peptide mapping have been used to examine alpha- and beta-tubulins from chordates, tunicates, echinoderms, mollusks, brachiopods, ferns, fungi, green algae and heliozoans. Cytoplasmic, ciliary, flagellar, and axopodial tubulins were examined. The results show that beta-tubulin is more conserved than alpha-tubulin. The large differences seen between axonemal and cytoplasmic tubulins and the similarity of all axonemal tubulins examined indicate that the genes for these two tubulin classes diverged prior to the appearance of metazoa and metaphyta. Comparisons of alpha-tubulins appear useful for tracing phyletic relationship within kingdoms whereas comparisons of beta-tubulins may be better for relating the kingdoms to each other.

Tubulin sequence conservation

Various aspects of the primary structure of tubulin are discussed and tubulin sequence data are compared. A hypothesis concerning the evolution of tubulin is also presented. The main points raised are: (1) Identical glycyl rich regions in alpha- and beta-tubulin, which are similar in both sequence and predicted secondary structure to a region in several nucleotide binding enzymes, may be involved in binding GTP. (2) Small regions of homology are present to actin, myosin and troponin T. These homologous regions may have the same function, resulting in a convergence of their sequences, or they may have arisen by a pathway of protein evolution which is still only very poorly understood. (3) The mutation rate between pig and chick brain tubulin is 0.22 PAMs (accepted point mutations/100 residues) per hundred million years, which is comparable to that of the histones. At an early time in its history, however, the tubulin heterodimer appears to have had a relatively high rate of mutation. This may have been during the evolution of the first eukaryotes.