Role of an upstream open reading frame in mediating arginine-specific translational control in Neurospora crassa

A series of arg-2-lacZ fusion genes from Neurospora crassa that lack Arg-specific regulation at the transcript level were utilized to demonstrate that the arg-2 upstream open reading frame (uORF) has both sequence-dependent and -independent consequences on translation. Findings revealed that both uORF translation and the predicted primary sequence of the leader peptide are important for Arg-specific translational control and that ribosome reinitiation does not seem to be needed for Arg-specific translational control.