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Two S. cerevisiae genes were found to exhibit dominant phenotypes useful for selecting transformants of industrial and laboratory strains of S. cerevisiae. FZF1-4, which confers sulfite resistance, was originally isolated and identified as RSU1-4, but the two genes are shown here to be allelic. Cysteine 57 in wild-type Fzf1p was found to be replaced by tyrosine in Fzf1-4p. Multicopy SSU1, which also confers sulfite resistance, was found to be somewhat less efficient. In both cases, a period of outgrowth in non-selective medium following transformation was found to be necessary. The number of transformants obtained was found to be strain-dependent, and also to depend on the sulfite concentration used during selection. Undesirable background growth of non-transformants was not observed at cell densities as high as 2.5 x 10(7)/plate. In two ura3 laboratory strains where selection for URA3 was applied independently of that for sulfite, the transformation efficiency for sulfite resistance was about 50% that for uracil prototrophy.

The effect of various covalent chemical modifications on the transesterification activity and stability of adsorbed lipase B from Candida antarctica (CALB) was studied in 2-butanone and o-xylene. CALB species modified with either polyethylene glycol 2000 monomethyl ether (MPEG), polyethylene glycol 300 mono-octyl ether (OPEG) or n-octanol (OCT) were used in combination with a hydrophobic (Accurel) and a hydrophilic (Duolite) support. The thermostabilities of adsorbed CALB in both solvents, and that of free CALB in o-xylene were not influenced by the modifications. In contrast, the thermostability of free CALB in 2-butanone decreased 2.5-fold after MPEG modification and increased 1.5-fold after modification with OPEG and n-octanol, compared to that of native CALB. The activities of the native and modified CALB species were up to 9-fold higher after adsorption onto Accurel than those of the corresponding free enzymes. Adsorption of these enzyme species onto Duolite only resulted in a 2- to 3-fold increase in the activity of OPEG- and OCT-modified CALB. The modified CALB species adsorbed onto Accurel show similar or up to 2-fold lower activities than do native adsorbed CALB species, while 1.5- to 6-fold higher activities were found for modified CALB species adsorbed onto Duolite. We propose that hydrophobic modifiers induce conformational changes of CALB during adsorption on a hydrophobic support whereas all three modifiers protect CALB from structural alterations during adsorption onto a hydrophilic support.

The yeast SUC2 gene, cloned on a multicopy plasmid pRB58, was used to study the effect of oxygen on the invertase expression of the recombinant Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Glucose repression was not the only factor affecting the invertase expression. The results obtained from the single-stage continuous cultures under microaerobic conditions showed that invertase expression was also strongly dependent on oxygen availability, and moving from anaerobic to aerobic conditions led to a five-fold increase in specific invertase activity. However, the cell yields under anaerobic conditions were quite low compared to those under aerobic conditions. These opposite effects of oxygen on cell growth and gene expression offer a strategy for maximizing invertase productivity by a two-stage continuous culture. The first stage was operated at a low level of glucose, around 100 mg/l, under aerobic conditions in order to obtain a high yield of yeast biomass, and the second stage maintained anaerobic conditions with residual glucose levels of 50 mg/l to derepress and fully induce invertase expression. The two-stage continuous culture resulted in a 2.5-fold increase in invertase productivity over that of a single-stage continuous culture.

The effect of N-linked glycosylation on secretion, activity, and stability of alpha-amylase from Aspergillus oryzae grown as dispersed filaments was studied. In the presence of tunicamycin the fungus grew either as dispersed filaments or as one large pellet, whereas growth was as dispersed filaments in all control cultures. The presence of tunicamycin affected neither biomass, level of secreted alpha-amylase, nor total amount of secreted protein in cultures growing as dispersed filaments. In these cultures both glycosylated and nonglycosylated alpha-amylase appeared in the culture medium as well as in the cells, whereas in control cultures only the glycosylated form of alpha-amylase was found in the medium and in the cells. The presence of nonglycosylated alpha-amylase in the medium seemed to result from active secretion rather than from autolysis of the mycelium or extracellular deglycosylation. Deglycosylation with Endo H of crude alpha-amylase in culture filtrate did not affect its stability towards heat, acid pH, or proteolytic degradation.

We have investigated the effect of different carbon sources and of different mutations on the capacity of two elements, UAS1 and UAS2, from the promoter of the FBP1 gene to form specific DNA-protein complexes and to activate expression of a reporter gene. The complexes are observed with nuclear extracts from yeast derepressed on glycerol or ethanol. When hxk2 mutants are grown on glucose the nuclear extracts are able to complex UAS1 but not UAS2, while for wild-type cells grown on galactose only the complex with UAS2 is formed. In contrast, in vivo the operation of both UASs is high in ethanol, moderate to low in glycerol, and negligible in galactose; no expression is observed in glucose even in a hxk2 background. There is no effect of a MIG1 deletion, either in the formation of DNA-protein complexes or on the expression of reporter genes.

A xylose reductase gene (xyl1) of Candida guilliermondii ATCC 20118 was cloned and characterized. The open reading frame of xyl1 contained 954 nucleotides encoding a protein of 317 amino acids with a predicted molecular mass of 36 kDa. The derived amino acid sequence of C. guilliermondii xylose reductase was 70.4% homologous to that of Pichia stipitis. The gene was placed under the control of an alcohol oxidase promoter (AOX1) and integrated into the genome of a methylotrophic yeast, Pichia pastoris. Methanol induced the expression of the 36-kDa xylose reductase in both intracellular and secreted expression systems. The expressed enzyme preferentially utilized NADPH as a cofactor and was functional both in vitro and in vivo. The different cofactor specificity between P. pastoris and C. guilliermondii xylose reductases might be due to the difference in the numbers of histidine residues and their locations between the two proteins. The recombinant was able to ferment xylose, and the maximum xylitol accumulation (7.8 g/l) was observed when the organism was grown under aerobic conditions.