Molecular weights, poly(A)-content, and partial separation of chick globin mRNAs

✍ Scribed by Walter Knochel; Dagmar Lange; Don Hendrick

• Book ID: 104769488
• Publisher: Springer
• Year: 1976
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 391 KB
• Volume: 3
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0301-4851
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00423228

✦ Synopsis

Poly(A)-containing 9S RNA from chick reticulocytes was electrophoresed on formamide-polyacrylamide gels. The molecular weight was determined to be 211 000 -+ 10 000 daltons. The RNA was separated into three different fractions with respect to molecular weight. These RNAs were translated in a wheat germ cell-free system. The lower molecular weight RNA directed up to 95% a-chain synthesis, compared to 60% for the higher molecular weight RNA. This was accompanied by a relative increase for/t-chain synthesis with increasing molecular weight. It could also be shown by hybridization with labelled poly(U) that the average poly(A) length decreased from about 83 nucleotides for fraction I to 36 nucleotides for fraction III. Our results suggest that fractionation of avian 9 S globin mRNA by electrophoresis on formamidepolyacrylamide gels is dependent upon two parameters, namely differences in the lengths of the non-poly(A)-containing portion of the a and r mRNAs and differences in the poly(A) lengths.