Mapping and spacer identification of rRNA operons of Salmonella typhimurium.

The rRNA operons of Salmonella typhimurium have been characterized with respect to their map position, orientation, and type of tRNA spacer. One of the seven rrn operons was found to be linked to pheA and another was found to be linked to aroE. This information, together with published information about the other five rrn operons, shows that S. typhimurium and Escherichia coli are essentially identical in terms of the number, the map position, and the orientation of all seven operons. S. typhimurium and E. coli were also similar in that four of the rrn spacer regions code for tRNAGlu2 and three code for tRNAAla1B. However, the two species differed in that rrnD coded for tRNAGlu2 and rrnB coded for tRNAAla1B in S. typhimurium. This is the opposite of the arrangement in E. coli. We have tabulated the coordinates of the BamHI and PstI sites flanking six of the S. typhimurium rrn genes and present revisions for the coordinates of some of the E. coli sites.