Suppressible alleles in a wide domain regulatory gene in Aspergillus nidulans.

The areA gene of Aspergillus nidulans is a one of the better studied eukaryotic wide domain regulatory genes, necessary for the expression of most structural genes involved in the utilization of a wide variety of nitrogen sources (Arst and Cove 1973; Arst 1983). Here we report the isolation and properties of areA alleles suppressible by translational suppressors (Roberts et al. 1979). Thus we show formally that the areA gene specifies a protein rather than an RNA product and we show that it is possible to generate by external suppression areA gene products with modified properties.