Analysis of carrot genes for proliferating cell nuclear antigen homologs with the aid of the polymerase chain reaction.

We designed a polymerase chain reaction-based strategy to obtain information about the origin and distribution of a newly discovered proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA) homolog. Carrot genomic segments were amplified using degenerate primers for two conserved regions of known PCNA homologs. The genes encoding the larger PCNA as well as typical PCNA contained introns. Thus, unlike processed PCNA pseudogenes in mammals, the larger homolog is not generated through reverse transcription of a typical PCNA mRNA. Moreover, introns of the larger PCNA homolog were positioned at the characteristic sites in plant PCNA genes. Attempts to amplify cDNA for an additional PCNA homolog from mammalian cells have been unsuccessful. These results suggest that the larger PCNA homolog was generated, presumably through gene duplication, after the divergence of the Planta and Animalia.