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Basic Information

Gene ID

1984

Name

EIF5A

Synonymous

eukaryotic translation initiation factor 5A;EIF5A;eukaryotic translation initiation factor 5A

Definition

eIF-4D|eIF-5A-1|eIF-5A1|eukaryotic initiation factor 5A|eukaryotic translation initiation factor 5A-1|rev-binding factor

Position

17p13-p12

Gene type

protein-coding

Title

Abstract

Temperature-sensitive eIF5A mutant accumulates transcripts targeted to the nonsense-mediated decay pathway.

The highly conserved protein eIF5A found in Archaea and ALL eukaryotes uniquely contains the posttranslationally formed amino acid hypusine. Despite being essential the functions of this protein and its modification remain unclear. To gain more insight into these functions temperature-sensitive mutants of the human EIF5A1 were characterized in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. expression of the point mutated form V81G in a DeltaeIF5A strain of yeast led to a strongly temperature-sensitive phenotype and to a significantly reduced protein level at restrictive temperature. The mutant showed accumulation of a subset of mRNAs that was also observed in nonsense-mediated decay (NMD)-deficient yeast strains. After short incubation at restrictive temperature the mutant exhibited increased half-lives of the intron containing CYH2 pre-mRNA and mature transcripts of NMD-dependent genes. Reduced telomere silencing and shortening was detected in the V81G mutant further supporting similarities to NMD-deficient strains. Our data suggest that eIF5A mediates important cellular processes like cell viability and senescence through its effects on the stability of certain mRNAs.

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