Controlling cell cycle progress in the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe

Rapamycin specifically interferes with the developmental response of fission yeast to starvation

Rapamycin is a microbial macrolide which belongs to a family of immunosuppressive drugs that suppress the immune system by blocking stages of signal transduction in T lymphocytes. In Saccharomyces cerevisiae cells, as in T lymphocytes, rapamycin inhibits growth and cells become arrested at the G1 stage of the cell cycle. Rapamycin is also an effective antifungal agent, affecting the growth of yeast and filamentous fungi. Unexpectedly, we observed that rapamycin has no apparent effect on the vegetative growth of Schizosaccharomyces pombe. Instead, the drug becomes effective only when cells experience starvation. Under such conditions, homothallic wild-type cells will normally mate and undergo sporulation. In the presence of rapamycin, this sexual development process is strongly inhibited and cells adopt an alternative physiological option and enter stationary phase. Rapamycin strongly inhibits sexual development of haploid cells prior to the stage of sexual conjugation. In contrast, the drug has only a slight inhibitory effect on the sporulation of diploid cells. A genetic approach was applied to identify the signal transduction pathway that is inhibited by rapamycin. The results indicate that either rapamycin did not suppress the derepression of sexual development of strains in which adenylate cyclase was deleted or the cyclic AMP-dependent protein kinase encoded by pka1 was mutated. Nor did rapamycin inhibit the unscheduled meiosis observed in pat1-114 mutants. Overexpression of ras1+, an essential gene for sexual development, did not rescue the sterility of rapamycin-treated cells. However, expression of the activated allele, ras1Val17, antagonized the effect of rapamycin and restored the ability of the cells to respond to mating signals in the presence of the drug. We discuss possible mechanisms for the inhibitory effect of rapamycin on sexual development in S. pombe.

Genetic analysis of human p34CDC2 function in fission yeast

The p34cdc2 protein kinase plays a key role in the control of the mitotic cell cycle of fission yeast, being required for both entry into S-phase and for entry into mitosis in the mitotic cell cycle, as well as for the initiation of the second meiotic nuclear division. In recent years, structural and functional homologues of p34cdc2, as well as several of the proteins that interact with and regulate p34cdc2 function in fission yeast, have been identified in a wide range of higher eukaryotic cell types, suggesting that the control mechanisms uncovered in this simple eukaryote are likely to be well conserved across evolution. Here we describe the construction and characterisation of a fission yeast strain in which the endogenous p34cdc2 protein is entirely absent and is replaced by its human functional homologue p34CDC2. We have used this strain to analyse aspects of the function of the human p34CDC2 protein genetically. We show that the function of the human p34CDC2 protein in fission yeast cells is dependent upon the action of the protein tyrosine phosphatase p80cdc25, that it responds to altered levels of both the mitotic inhibitor p107wee1 and the p34cdc2-binding protein p13suc1, and is lethal in combination with the mutant B-type cyclin p56cdc13-117. In addition, we demonstrate that the human p34CDC2 protein is proficient for fission yeast meiosis, and examine the behaviour of two mutant p34CDC2 proteins in fission yeast.

Mutational analysis of the fission yeast p34cdc2 protein kinase gene

The p34cdc2 protein serine-threonine kinase plays an essential role in the life cycle of fission yeast, being required for both the G1-S and G2-M transitions during mitotic growth, and also for the second meiotic nuclear division. Functional homologues of p34cdc2 (each ca. 60% identical to the fission yeast prototype) have been isolated from organisms as diverse as humans, insects and plants, and there is now considerable evidence supporting the view that fundamental aspects of the cell cycle controls uncovered in fission yeast will prove to be conserved in all eukaryotes. By comparing the amino acid sequences of fission yeast p34cdc2 with its higher eukaryotic counterparts it is possible to identify conserved residues that are likely to be centrally important for p34cdc2 function. Here the effects are described of mutating a number of these conserved residues. Twenty-three new mutant alleles have been constructed and tested. We show that replacing cysteine 67 with tryptophan renders the resulting mutant protein p80cdc25-independent (while neither leucine, isoleucine nor valine has this effect) and that several of the amino acids within the highly conserved PSTAIRE region are not absolutely required for p34cdc2 function. Five acidic amino acids have also been mutated within p34cdc2, which are invariant across the eukaryotic protein kinase family. Acid-to-base mutations at three of these residues resulted in a dominant-negative, cell cycle arrest phenotype while similar mutations at the other two simply abolished p34cdc2 protein function. The results are discussed with reference to the predicted tertiary structure of the p34cdc2 enzyme.

What is the minimum number of dedicated functions required for a basic cell cycle?

The genome of Escherichia coli has a coding capacity for about 4500 proteins but only a small number of these appear to be specific for the periodic events (initiation of DNA replication, chromosome partitioning and cell division) that punctuate the cell-duplication cycle: furthermore, many of these cell cycle dedicated functions are dispensible under certain conditions, although their presence undoubtedly increases the fitness of the organism to survive in a competitive environment. A simplified but effective cell replication cycle can probably operate with only a few cycle-dedicated proteins, in addition to those required for cell growth itself.

Cold-sensitive mutants of p34cdc2 that suppress a mitotic catastrophe phenotype in fission yeast

The p34cdc2 protein kinase plays a central role in the regulation of the eukaryotic cell cycle, being required both in late G1 for the commitment to S-phase and in late G2 for the initiation of mitosis. p34cdc2 also determines the precise timing of entry into mitosis in fission yeast, where a number of gene products that regulate p34cdc2 activity have been identified and characterised. To investigate further the mitotic role of p34cdc2 in this organism we have isolated new cold-sensitive p34cdc2 mutants. These are defective only in their G2 function and are extragenic suppressors of the lethal premature entry into mitosis brought about by mutating the mitotic inhibitor p107wee1 and overproducing the mitotic activator p80cdc25. One of the mutant proteins p34cdc2-E8 is only functional in the absence of p107wee1, and all the mutant strains have reduced histone H1 kinase activity in vitro. Each mutant allele has been cloned and sequenced, and the lesions responsible for the cold-sensitive phenotypes identified. All the mutations were found to map to regions that are conserved between the fission yeast p34cdc2 and functional homologues from higher eukaryotes.

Molecular cloning and sequence analysis of cdc27+ required for the G2-M transition in the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe

The cell division cycle gene cdc27+ of the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe is required for the transition from G2 into mitosis. Genetic and physiological experiments suggest a close relationship between cdc27+ and the cdc2+ gene, a key regulator of mitosis in yeast and also in higher eukaryotic cells. We isolated the cdc27+ gene by complementation of a temperature-sensitive cdc27 mutant. The DNA sequence of this gene predicts a 1116 nucleotide open reading frame split by five short introns, ranging in size from 49 to 74 nucleotides. Analysis of cDNA clones confirmed the structure of the gene. The deduced cdc27+ gene product consists of 372 amino acids with a predicted Mr of 43 kDa. No homology of the predicted protein with known proteins could be found, thus the cdc27+ gene encodes a novel function required for the G2-M transition. Northern analysis revealed two mRNAs of 1.4 and 2.2 kb transcribed from this gene, the smaller transcript being approximately tenfold more abundant than the larger. The level of cdc27+ mRNAs remained constant through the cell cycle indicating that the time of action of the cdc27+ gene, which is known to be regulated by elements of the mitotic control, is not determined by periodic accumulation of its transcripts.