Genetic variants of the Bombyx mori silkworn encoding sericin proteins of different lengths.

A variant sericin polypeptide originally found by acid gel electrophoresis in the Nd-s mutant strain of the silkworm, Bombyx mori, has been analyzed genetically. The variant polypeptide (called S-2v) is encoded by a gene which behaves as a codominant allele of the gene encoding the standard S-2 sericin polypeptide. Linkage analysis locates these alleles at 0.0 map unit on chromosome 11. SDS-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis shows that the molecular weight of the S-2v variant polypeptide is lower by approximately 62,500 than that of the S-2 polypeptide. Amino acid analysis indicates that the two sericin polypeptides have similar compositions. These results are consistent with the idea that the variant allele arose by deletion within the S-2 coding sequence in the Src-2 gene locus as the result of unequal recombination.