US006093809A United States Patent (19) 11 Patent Number: 6,093,809 Cech et al. (45) Date of Patent: Jul. 25, 2000 54) TELOMERASE Lingner et al., “Telomerase RNAS of different ciliates have a common Secondary Structure and a permuted template,” 75 Inventors: Thomas R. Cech, Boulder, Colo.; Genes Develop., 8:1984 1994). Joachim Lingner, Epalinges, Biessmann et al., “Addition of Telomere-ASSociated HeT Switzerland DNA Sequences “Heals” Broken Chromosome Ends in 73 Assignees: University Technology Corporation, Drosophilia,” Cell 61:663 1990). Sheen and Levis, “Transposition of the LINE-like ret Boulder, Colo., Geron Corporation, rotransposon TART to Drosophilia chromosome termini,” Menlo Park, Calif. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci., 91:12510 1994). Kipling and Cooke, "HyperVariable ultra-long telomeres in 21 Appl. No.: 08/851,843 mice,” Nature 347:400 1990). 22 Filed: May 6, 1997 Starling et al., “Extensive telomere repeat arrays in mouse are hypervariable,” Nucleic Acids Res., 18:6881 1990). 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C12N 5/OO Primary Examiner Yvonne Eyler WO 98/O1542 1/1998 WIPO . ... C12N 9/12 Attorney, Agent, or Firm Townsend and Townsend and WO 98/O1543 1/1998 WIPO .............................. C12N 9/12 Crew LLP WO 98/45450 10/1998 WIPO ............................ C12N 15/54 57 ABSTRACT OTHER PUBLICATIONS The present invention is directed to novel telomerase nucleic Zakian, “Telomeres: Beginning to Understand the End,” acids and amino acids. In particular, the present invention is Science 270: 1601 1995). directed to nucleic acid and amino acid Sequences encoding Blackburn and Gall, “A tandemly repeated Sequence at the various telomerase protein Subunits and motifs, including termini of the extrachromosomal ribosomal RNA genes in the 123 kDa and 43 kDa telomerase protein subunits of Tetrahymena,” J. Mol. Biol., 120:33 1978). 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