Use of a bacterial Hygromycin B resistance gene as a dominant selectable marker in Neurospora crassa

Dominant transformation markers allow maximum flexibility in the choice of transformation recipients. Creative Commons License This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 License. Authors C. Staben, B. Jensen, M. Singer, J. Pollock, M. Schechtman, J. Kinsey, and E. Selker This regular paper is available in Fungal Genetics Reports: http://newprairiepress.org/fgr/vol36/iss1/22 Staben, C. ^1, B. Jensen^2, M. Singer^2 Dominant transformation markers allow maximum flexibility in the choice of transformation J. Pollock^3. M. Schechtman^3,4, recipients. The most widely used transformation marker in N. crassa has been the Neurospora gene J. Kinsey^5 and E. Selker^2 conferring benomyl resistance (Orbach, et al. 1986 Mol. Cell. Biol. 6:2456-2461). UnfortunateUse of a bacterial Hygromycin B resistance gene as a dominant ly, this marker is usually inactivated during sexual crosses, presumably because its introduction by transformation generates strains with duplicate ß-tubulin sequences that are subject to selectable marker in Neurospora inactivation during the sexual cycle by RIP (Selker et al. 1987 Cell 51:741-752; Selker and crassa transformation. Garrett, 1988 Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 85:68706874). We therefore looked for a dominant drug resistance marker that would not be homologous to any sequence in the Neurospora genome. A number of researchers have found that a bacterial gene encoding hygromycin B resistance (hph, hygromycin B phosphotransferase), if driven by a eukaryotic promoter, can confer drug resistance on eukaryotic cells. Hygromycin B (hygB) is an amino-glycoside that inhibits protein synthesis by causing mistranslation (Gonzalez et al. 1978 Biochim. Biophys. Acta 521:459-469) and by interfering with protein translocation (Singh et al. 1979 Nature 277:146-148). In fungi, Grits and Davies have had promising results in the use of the hph gene in yeast (Gritz and Davies 1983 Gene 29:179-188). Punt et al. and Cullen et al. have had success using this gene in both A. nidulans and A. niger (Punt et al. 1987 Gene 56:117-124; Cullen et al. 1987 Gene 57:21-26). Here we report the sensitivity of Neurospora to hygB and the use of two existing plasmids and derivatives as transformation markers in Neurospora. All of the strains of Neurospora that we have tested (approx. 15) are sensitive to hygB. We generally use Vogel's minimal medium with sorbose for plates or sucrose for slants. We have selected resistance in a number of supplemented media, including a complete medium. HygB was obtained from Calbiochem. The commercial powder is dissolved in sterile water at 200 mg/ml and added to autoclaved media. Media can be stored for several months at 4°C. A number of different sensitivity tests have been performed. I n general, strains are sensitive to 150 ug/ml hygB. Several different plating conditions have been used to isolate transformants produced by standard procedures (Vollmer and Yanofsky 1986 Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 83:4869-4873). Our standard conditions involve plating 5 x 10^6 spheroplasts on a 25 ml sorbose plate (200 ug/ml hygB) in 8 ml top agar lacking hygB. Top and bottom layers usually contain 1.5% agar. Decreasing the volume of top agar or increasing the hygB concentration increases the stringency of the selection and improves the background, but discriminates against some transformants and lowers the apparent transformation frequency. We have used similar selection conditions to isolate hyg^r mutants from mutagenized conidia. The frequency of spontaneous mutation to hyg^r is not high enough to interfere with the selection. Our initial transformations used either pAN7-1 (Punt et al. 1987 Gene 56:117-124) or pDH25 (Cullen et al. 1987 Gene 57:21-26). These plasmids contain Aspergillus transcription signals that direct the expression of the E. coli hph gene. We have made derivatives of these plasmids that other researchers may find useful. Two of these, pCSN43 and pCSN44, contain a SalI fragment of pDH25 that confers resistance as well as pDH25. These plasmids provide additional unique cloning sites (Figure 1A, 1B). They offer the additional advantage that they replicate to a very high copy number in E. coli. The SalI fragment from pDH25 that is present in pCSN43 and pCSN44 has been transferred into several other plasmids, and has conferred hygB^r in each case. In pES200 the trpC terminator has been deleted from pDH25 leaving a single BamHI site (Figure 1C). This plasmid is as effective as pDH25 in conferring hygB resistance; the single BamHI site allows convenient cloning of BamHI compatible restriction fragments. We have not mapped the actual transcription signals or start sites that direct hph gene expression in N. crassa, though the structure-activity relationship for the trpC promoter has been studied in Aspergillus (Hamer and Timberlake 1987 Mol. Cell. Biol. 7:2352-2359). Surprisingly, insertion of a 430 bp TaqI fragment from the zeta region (Selker and Stevens, 1985 Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 82:8114-8118) into the ClaI site of pDH25, separating the promoter from the hph coding reion, did not abolish hygB^r. However, the ClaI-BamHI fragment containing the hph coding region is not sufficient for resistance. Plasmids pES200, pCSN43 and pCSN44 are available from the Fungal Genetics Stock Center.