SGD Paper 
Levin-Salomon V, et al. (2009) When expressed in yeast, mammalian mitogen-activated protein kinases lose proper regulation and become spontaneously phosphorylated. Biochem J 417(1):331-40
Abstract: MAPKs are key components in cell signaling pathways. Under optimal growth conditions, their activity is kept off, but in response to stimulation it is dramatically evoked. Because of the high degree of evolutionary conservation at the levels of sequence and mode of activation, MAPKs are believed to share similar regulatory mechanisms in all eukaryotes and to be functionally substitutable between them. To assess the reliability of this notion, we systematically analyzed the activity, regulation and phenotypic effects of mammalian MAPKs in yeast. Unexpectedly, all mammalian MAPKs tested were spontaneously phosphorylated in yeast. Jnks lost their phosphorylation in pbs2Delta cells, but p38s and Erks maintained their spontaneous phosphorylation even in pbs2Deltaste7Deltamkk1Deltamkk2Delta cells. Kinase-dead variants of Erks and p38s were phosphorylated in strains lacking a single MEK, but not in pbs2Deltaste7Deltamkk1Deltamkk2Delta cells. Thus, in yeast, p38 and Erks are phosphorylated via a combined mechanism of autophosphorylation and MEK-mediated phosphorylation (any MEK). We further addressed the mechanism allowing mammalian MAPKs to exploit yeast MEKs in the absence of any activating signal. We suggest that mammalian MAPKs lost during evolution a C-terminal region that exists in some yeast MAPKs. Indeed, removal of this region from Hog1 and Mpk1 rendered them spontaneously and highly phosphorylated. It implies that MAPKs possess an efficient inherent autoposphorylation capability that is suppressed in yeast MAPKs via a C-terminal domain and in mammalian MAPKs via yet unknown means.
| Status: Published | Type: Journal Article | PubMed ID: 18778243 |
Topics addressed in this paper
Number of different genes curated to this paper: 6
- To find other papers on a gene and topic, click on the colored ball in the appropriate box.
- displays other papers with information about that topic for that gene.
- displays other papers in SGD that are associated with that topic.
The topic is addressed in these papers but does not describe a specific gene or chromosomal feature.
- To go to the Locus page for a gene, click on the gene name.
