Functional and bioinformatics analyses reveal conservation of cis-regulatory elements between sciaridae and drosophilidae

The sciarid DNA puff C4 BhC4-1 gene is amplified and transcribed in salivary glands at the end of the larval stage. In transgenic Drosophila, the BhC4-1 promoter drives transcription in prepupal salivary glands and in the ring gland of late embryos. A bioinformatics analysis has identified 162 sequences similar to distinct regions of the BhC4-1 proximal promoter, which are predominantly located either in 5′ or 3′ regions or introns in the Drosophila melanogaster genome. A significant number of the identified sequences are found in the regulatory regions of Drosophila genes that are expressed in the salivary gland. Functional assays in Drosophila reveal that the BhC4-1 proximal promoter contains both a 129 bp (−186/−58) salivary gland enhancer and a 67 bp (−253/−187) ring gland enhancer that drive tissue specific patterns of developmentally regulated gene expression, irrespective of their orientation. genesis 46:43–51, 2008. © 2008 Wiley-Liss, Inc.