Characterization of fatty acid synthetase cDNA clone and its mRNA.

Four cDNA clones have been identified by hybrid-select translation to contain the sequences complementary to fatty acid synthetase mRNA. The restriction mapping of these clones indicated that three of these, pFAS-7, pFAS-17 and pFAS-18, have sequences in common, and a fourth, pFAS-15, did not hybridize with the others, suggesting sequence to another region of the mRNA. Northern analysis of cytoplasmic poly(A) +RNA showed the presence of two bands at 9.2 Kb and 8.4 Kb. Similar analysis of nuclear RNA also showed the presence of two bands at 14 and 11 Kb. These probably represent unprocessed transcripts. Southern analysis of genomic DNA digested with EcoRI, BamHI, HindIII and PstI indicate the presence of a single gene copy for fatty acid synthetase.