Nucleotide sequence of a Euglena gracilis chloroplast genome region coding for the elongation factor Tu; evidence for a spliced mRNA.

We characterize a 1.95 kb transcription product of the Euglena gracilis chloroplast DNA fragment Eco-N + Q by S1 nuclease analysis and DNA sequencing and show that it is the product of three splicing events. Exon 1 (0.45 kb), exon 2 (0.74 kb) and 175 nucleotides of exon 3 (0.53 kb) code for the chloroplast elongation factor protein (EF-Tu). The remaining part of exon 3 and exon 4 (0.23 kb) have unidentified open reading frames. The chloroplast EF-Tu protein has 408 aminoacids and is to 70% homologous with the E. coli EF-Tu protein. The active site for aminoacyl-tRNA binding is highly conserved, while the active site for GTP/GDP binding lacks the cysteine present in the E. coli EF-Tu protein. The two introns separating exons 1, 2 and 3 are, respectively, 103 and 110 nucleotides long. The size of the third intron is not yet determined. The splicing rules for eukaryote mRNA are not followed.