Genomic clones of Aspergillus nidulans containing alcA, the structural gene for alcohol dehydrogenase and alcR, a regulatory gene for ethanol metabolism.

Our aim was to obtain from Aspergillus nidulans a genomic bank and then clone a region we expected from earlier genetic mapping to contain two closely linked genes, alcA, the structural gene for alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH) and alcR, a positive trans-acting regulatory gene for ethanol metabolism. The expression of alcA is repressed by carbon catabolites. A genomic restriction fragment characteristic of the alcA-alcR region was identified, cloned in pBR322, and used to select from a genomic bank in lambda EMBL3A three overlapping clones covering 24 kb of DNA. Southern genomic analysis of wild-type, alcA and alcR mutants showed that the mutants contained extra DNA at sites near the center of the cloned DNA and are close together, as expected for alcA and alcR. Transcription from the cloned DNA and hybridization with a clone carrying the Saccharomyces cerevisiae gene for ADHI (ADC1) are both confined to the alcA-alcR region. At least one of several species of mature mRNA is about 1 kb, the size required to code for ADH. For all species, carbon catabolite repression overrides control by induction. The overall characteristics of transcription, hybridization to ADC1 and earlier work suggest that alcA consists of a number of exons and/or that the alcA-alcR region represents a cluster of alcA-related genes or sequences.