Possible identification of CENP-C in fish and the presence of the CENP-C motif in M18BP1 of vertebrates. [version 2; referees: 2 approved]

• Main Author: Leos Kral
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: F1000 Research Ltd 2016-01-01
• Series: F1000Research
• Subjects: Protein Chemistry & Proteomics
• Online Access: http://f1000research.com/articles/4-474/v2

The centromeric protein CENP-C is a base component of the kinetochore. This protein, along with CENP-A has been shown to adaptively evolve in a number of animal and plant species. In order to determine if CENP-C also evolves in fish species, I attempted to retrieve fish CENP-C sequences from GenBank. No Teleostei CENP-C sequences were found either by name or by BLASTP searches with the vertebrate CENP-C motif sequence. A number of putative Teleostei protein sequences were identified in GenBank that have homology to the C-terminal cupin domain of vertebrate CENP-C. These proteins only have partial homology to the CENP-C motif, but evidence is presented that makes it likely that these fish proteins are orthologs of CENP-C. Interestingly, it was also discovered that the CENP-C motif sequence is also mostly present in M18BP1 proteins of fish and some other vertebrates but not in mammals. This finding may have implications for CENP-C and M18BP1 assembly in centromeric regions of different vertebrate taxa.