Cloning and nucleotide sequence of chloroplast psaA gene from sorghum.

The 6.7 kb EcoRI fragment containing the sorghum chloroplast psaA gene was cloned. The restriction endonuclease map and the nucleotide sequence were determined. The length of the determined nucleotide sequence was 3080 bp, of which the psaA coding sequence was 2253 bp, which encoded a polypeptide of 750 amino acids with a estimated molecular weight of 83000. The homologies of this psaA gene of sorghum with those of maize, rice and spinach were 99.4%, 96.3% and 89.4%, respectively, and the homologies of the deduced polypeptide sequences were 99.3%, 98.0% and 95.7%, respectively. We found that a difference in the profiles of the hydrophobic distribution of P700 apoproteins existed between C4 and C3 plants due to a change occurred at the 493th amino acid (C4 plants: Gly; C3 plants: Arg or Ser).