A consensus sequence polymer inhibits in vivo expression of heat shock genes.

Promoter function for hsp70 gene expression in Drosophila melanogaster was studied with an in vivo competition assay. A polymer of 40 tandem copies of the pair of regulatory elements of the hsp70 gene was constructed and cloned into a plasmid vector. Various marked genes were cotransfected with the polymer plasmid into Schneider line 2 cells, and their expression was determined by enzyme activity measurements. The polymer dramatically inhibited expression of cotransfected hsp70, hsp26, and hsp83 genes, but not cotransfected copia and histone genes. Our results indicate that in vivo, a trans-acting, positive regulatory factor, which can be titrated by heat shock consensus sequences, is required for activation of heat shock genes and is specific for these genes; the coordinate induction of different heat shock genes appears to be mediated by similar, but not identical, interactions of the trans-acting induction factor and the cis-acting heat shock consensus sequences; and the uninduced or basal level expression of the transfected hsp70 gene is also due to interaction of the consensus sequence with a positively acting factor.