CSM News Electronic Edition Volume 4, number 11 March 25, 1995 Please submit abstracts of your papers as soon as they have been accepted for publication by sending them to CSM-News@worms.cmsbio.nwu.edu. Back issues of CSM-News, the CSM Reference database and other useful information is available by anonymous ftp from worms.cmsbio.nwu.edu [165.124.233.50], via Gopher at the same address, or by World Wide Web at the URL "http://worms.cmsbio.nwu.edu/dicty.html" =========== Abstracts =========== Cloning and Expression in Escherichia coli of a cDNA Encoding a Developmentally Regulated Ca2+-binding Protein from Dictyostelium discoideum Barrie Coukell, John Moniakis and Avie Grindberg Department of Biology, York University, 4700 Keele St., North York, Ontario, CANADA, M3J 1P3 FEBS Lett., in press Abstract: We have cloned a full-length cDNA from Dictyostelium discoideum which encodes a new Ca2+-binding protein. The deduced protein (termed CBP1) is composed of 156 amino acids and contains four consensus metal-ligating loop sequences found in helix-loop-helix motifs of many Ca2+-binding proteins. When expressed in bacteria as a GST fusion protein, CBP1 binds Ca2+ in a 45Ca2+ overlay assay. CBP1 exhibits little amino acid sequence homology with Dictyostelium calmodulin or calfumirin-1 (CAF-1) except in the putative Ca2+-binding regions. Moreover, unlike calmodulin and CAF-1 expression, CBP1 mRNA is expressed preferentially during the multicellular stages of development. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- [End CSM-News, volume 4, number 11]