A Trna Modification Counteracts a +2 Ribosomal Frameshift
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Downloaded from genesdev.cshlp.org on September 30, 2021 - Published by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press Translational misreading: a tRNA modification counteracts a +2 ribosomal frameshift Damien Brégeon,1,4 Vincent Colot,2,3 Miroslav Radman,1 and François Taddei1 1INSERM EPI9916, Faculté de Médecine Necker-Enfants Malades, 75730 Paris Cedex 15, France; 2Institut Jacques Monod, CNRS-Universités Paris 6 et Paris 7, 75251 Paris Cedex 05, France Errors during gene expression from DNA to proteins via transcription and translation may be deleterious for the functional maintenance of cells. In this paper, extensive genetic studies of the misreading of a GA repeat introduced into the lacZ gene of Escherichia coli indicate that in this bacteria, errors occur predominantly by a +2 translational frameshift, which is controlled by a tRNA modification involving the MnmE and GidA proteins. This ribosomal frameshift results from the coincidence of three events: (1) decreased codon– anticodon affinity at the P-site, which is caused by tRNA hypomodification in mnmE− and gidA− strains; (2) a repetitive mRNA sequence predisposing to slippage; and (3) increased translational pausing attributable to the presence of a rare codon at the A-site. Based on genetic analysis, we propose that GidA and MnmE act in the same pathway of tRNA modification, the absence of which is responsible for the +2 translational frameshift. The difference in the impact of the mutant gene on cell growth, however, indicates that GidA has at least one other function. [Key Words: Translational fidelity; 5-methylaminomethyl-2-thio-uridine; gidA; mnmE; thdF; argU] Received May 10, 2001; revised version accepted July 2, 2001. Processes ensuring the fidelity of DNA replication have direct alteration of the mRNA or by misincorporation of been studied extensively, presumably because of the altered mutagenic nucleotides, such as 8-oxo-GTP, by overwhelming importance of gene mutations in evolu- the RNA polymerase (Taddei et al. 1997). The presence tion, hereditary diseases and cancer (Friedberg et al. of 8-oxo-G in cellular RNA was shown to be restricted to 1995). In contrast, less is known about the fidelity of vulnerable neurons in dementia such as Alzheimer’s dis- transcription and translation, which must be crucial for ease (AD) (Nunomura et al. 1999) or Parkinson’s disease the functional maintenance of cells and organisms. (Zhang et al. 1999) and to be correlated with the synthe- Functional degeneration of nondividing cells limits the sis of altered proteins (Dukan et al. 2000). The rate of lifespan of organs such as the heart or brain. Therefore, transcriptional frameshifting is unknown but it was pro- decreasing fidelity of gene expression may be an under- posed that it may lead to some neurodegenerative dis- lying cause of cellular aging, degenerative diseases, and eases (van Leeuwen et al. 1998b). In patients with AD, death. Accurate gene expression is dependent on the fi- the accumulation of aberrant protein species shifted to delity of both transcription of DNA and translation of the +1 frame with no related mutation in the DNA blue- mRNA. print has been reported. The appearance of those proteins Fidelity of transcription depends on proofreading by a was shown to be caused by a molecular misreading of a 3Ј → 5Ј exonuclease activity found in a number of eu- coding GA repeat resulting in the deletion of a dinucleo- karyotic and prokaryotic RNA polymerases (Thomas et tide GA in the mRNA (Hol et al. 1998; van Leeuwen et al. 1998). The Escherichia coli RNA polymerase exhibits al. 1998a,b). error rates ranging from 1 to 10 misincorporations per Translational errors have been characterized in E. coli 105 synthesized nucleotides (for review, see Libby and and measured in vivo and/or in vitro (for review, see Gallant 1991). Aberrant RNAs also include the presence Kurland 1992). These include missense errors resulting of altered nucleotides in the mRNA caused either by in the substitution of one amino acid for another, or incorporation of extra amino acids caused by read- through of termination codons. Overall, translational er- rors occur at a frequency of 10−3 to 10−4 (Loftfield and 3Present address: Unité de Recherches en Génomique Végétale (INRA-CNRS), 91057 Evry cedex, France. Vanderjagt 1972; Edelmann and Gallant 1977; Ellis and 4Corresponding author. Gallant 1982; Parker 1989) and are limited by the ability E-MAIL [email protected]; FAX 33-1-40-61-53-22. Article and publication are at http://www.genesdev.org/cgi/doi/10.1101/ of the ribosome to discriminate between correct and in- gad.207701. correct tRNAs entering the A-site (Thompson 1988; Ni- GENES & DEVELOPMENT 15:2295–2306 © 2001 by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press ISSN 0890-9369/01 $5.00; www.genesdev.org 2295 Downloaded from genesdev.cshlp.org on September 30, 2021 - Published by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press Brégeon et al. Table 1. Sequences of alleles used and their corresponding -galactosidase activities Stop codon -Galactosidase Allele Sequencea positionb activityc lacZ+ AAT GA A T CA GG C 3073 12400 ± 10 Asn Gl u Se r Gl y lacZ (+GA) AAT GAG AGA G T G G C1603 0.10 ± 0.01 Asn Gl u Ar g Va l lacZ+ revertants AAT GAG AG T GG C3073 12600 ± 240 Asn Gl u Se r Gl y lacZ (+ Arg462) AAT GAG AGA A G T GGC3076 0.01 ± 0.001 Asn Gl u Ar g S e r Gl y aAll sequences are shown from codon 460 of the lacZ gene. bNucleotide number of the first base of the following stop codon. cMiller units ± standard error. erhaus 1990; Czworkowski and Moore 1996). When in- repeat in E. coli. A reporter system for such errors was duced by the addition of some antibiotics (e.g., strepto- constructed using the lacZ gene encoding the -galacto- mycin), translational misreading leads to increased sidase enzyme. concentrations of oxidized proteins (Dukan et al. 2000), The constructed lacZ(+GA) frameshifted allele con- which were found to accumulate in aging cells (Stadt- tains a repetition of the dinucleotide GA starting from man 1992). Other translational errors include premature the first base of codon 461 to the first base of codon 463 termination (Menninger 1977; Kurland et al. 1996) and (Table 1). These codons normally encode amino acids translational frameshifting. The latter generally gives involved in the active site of -galactosidase (Cupples rise to a shorter peptide because of the subsequent en- and Miller 1988). This insertion results in a sequence counter of stop codons in the shifted frame. Spontaneous shifted to the +2 reading frame when compared with the frameshifts resulting from translational errors occur at a wild-type sequence and the emergence of a premature frequency of <10−5 per codon (Kurland 1992), but were stop codon 210 nucleotides downstream, thereby gener- shown to increase in E. coli cells entering stationary ating a mRNA encoding a 534-amino-acid polypeptide. phase (Barak et al. 1996). The -galactosidase activity of NECB1 cells, which carry Basic mechanisms involved in DNA replication, re- this new allele, is 125,000 times lower than the activity combination, transcription, and translation are often of the isogenic lacZ+ cells (Table 1). As a result, NECB1 conserved phylogenetically (Lewin 1994). Therefore, we cells are not able to grow on minimal media containing set out to study in E. coli the source of errors brought lactose as the sole source of carbon, and form white colo- about by the presence of a GA repeat within an engi- nies on LB plates containing X-Gal (5-bromo-4-chloro-3- neered frameshifted allele of the lacZ gene (Table 1). The indolyl--D-galactopyranoside). characterization of E. coli mutants expressing an inter-  mediate level of -galactosidase led to the identification Only deletion of a dinucleotide GA can restore of three genes that are involved in the faithful transla- an active -galactosidase tion of the GA repeat. Two of these genes, mnmE and gidA, are involved in tRNA modification and the third, To study errors on this GA repeat, we first wanted to Arg argU, encodes the tRNAmnm5UCU. The analysis of the establish the spectrum of mutants that could restore par- mechanism of this unusual +2 translational frameshift at tially or totally the -galactosidase activity. This ques- this sequence is consistent with the recently proposed tion was addressed by selecting for spontaneous rever- +1/−1 translational frameshift dual error model (Qian et al. 1998; Björk et al. 1999; Farabaugh and Björk 1999), Table 2. Generation time of strains in various growth media which can be extended to explain larger ribosomal at 40°C frameshifting and short tRNA hopping. Measurements a of the growth rate of strains carrying a mutation in the Media gidA or mnmE genes showed that the impact of tRNA Relevant genotypes LB Mm + 0.4% glucose hypomodification varies with nutritional conditions and is not equivalent for both strains (Table 2). These obser- Wild type (NECB1) 32.9 ± 0.7 75.7 ± 3.7 gidAϻTn10 38.0 ± 1.2b 91.1 ± 3.4e vations suggest that GidA may also be involved in other mnmEϻTn10 38.2 ± 0.4c 77.7 ± 2.5 pathways. gidAϻTn10, mnmEϻkan 45.2 ± 0.7d 95.8 ± 2.0f a Results Numbers represent the average generation time of 5 cultures given in minutes ± SEM. b–f The reporter system Generation times that are significantly different from that of the wild type in the same medium. T-test comparison between We studied the control of error rates of expression (tran- WT and mutants grown in the same media have the following scription or translation) of a gene containing a coding GA P-values: b, 0.0054; c, 0.0002; d, <0.0001; e, 0.0154; f, 0.0013.