Worm Breeder's Gazette 10(2): 14
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unc-51(e369) was found to be an amber allele by Ed Hedgecock. Throughout life time, unc-51 animals are severely uncoordinated, especially in the posterior part of the animal. Cross suppression tests and reversion experiments (by EMS) were carried out. Revertants isolated by Sydney Brenner (EMS) and by Ed Hedgecock (EMS) were also analyzed by oligomer Southern to detect the single base change at the anticodon of tRNA(Trp) genes. For cross suppression tests, an unc-51; as constructed for each suppressor (except *'s), and evaluated for the extent of restoration of movement. Results are summarized below: [See Figure 1] These results show that the suppression pattern of unc-51 by the eight known suppressors is very similar to that of unc-13: it is suppressed effectively by only sup-5 and sup-7, weakly by sup-24 and not detectably suppressed by others. unc-13 affects the nervous system (I. Maruyama, WBG vol. 9, #3, 33). An amber allele of unc-52 which is presumably expressed in muscle cells is suppressed to a similar extent by each of seven tRNA(Trp) suppressors (sup-29 was the only one not active). The suppression pattern might suggest that unc- 51 is not a muscle-gene but a neuronal-gene, consistent with the observation that the unc-51 mutant animal has normal muscle structure. To date about 130 revertants from unc-13, dpy-20, n analyzed. Eight out of 12 tRNA(trp) genes have been converted to amber suppressors (same as WBG vol.10, #1, 54), but four are still silent (two are probably pseudogenes).