From EST sequence to spider silk spinning: identification and molecular characterisation of Nephila senegalensis major ampullate gland peroxidase NsPox

Spider dragline silk is renowned as one of the toughest materials of its kind. In nature, spider silks are spun out of aqueous solutions under environmental conditions. This is in contrast to production of most synthetic fibres, where hazardous solvents, high temperatures and pressure are used. In o...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Insect biochemistry and molecular biology 2003-02, Vol.33 (2), p.229-238
Main Authors: Pouchkina, N.N., Stanchev, B.S., McQueen-Mason, S.J.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Amino Acid Sequence
Animals
Base Sequence
DNA, Complementary
Dragline silk
Drosophila melanogaster - enzymology
Drosophila melanogaster - genetics
Expressed Sequence Tags
Gene Library
In Situ Hybridization
Insect Proteins - genetics
Molecular Sequence Data
Nephila senegalensis
Peroxidase
Peroxidases - chemistry
Peroxidases - genetics
Sequence Alignment
Sequence Homology, Amino Acid
Silk
Silk spinning
Spider
Spiders - genetics
Spiders - physiology
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Spider dragline silk is renowned as one of the toughest materials of its kind. In nature, spider silks are spun out of aqueous solutions under environmental conditions. This is in contrast to production of most synthetic fibres, where hazardous solvents, high temperatures and pressure are used. In order to identify some of the chemical processes involved in spider silk spinning, we have produced a collection of cDNA sequences from specific regions of Nephila senegalensis major ampullate gland. We examined in detail the sequence and expression of a putative Nephila senegalensis peroxidase gene ( NsPox) from our EST collection. NsPox encodes a protein with similarity to Drosophila melanogaster and Aedes aegypti peroxidases. Northern analysis and in situ localisation experiments revealed that NsPox is expressed in major and minor ampullate glands of the spider where the main components of the dragline silk are produced. We suggest that NsPox plays a role in dragline silk fibre formation and/or processing.
ISSN:0965-1748
1879-0240
DOI:10.1016/S0965-1748(02)00207-2