Identification of a transcript and its promoter region on the archaebacterial plasmid pME2001.

The cryptic multicopy plasmid pME2001 of Methanobacterium thermoautotrophicum Marburg encodes a 611-base-pair transcript containing several consecutive, short open reading frames. Scrutiny of the 5'-flanking region did not reveal homology to putative archaebacterial consensus promoter sequences. However, 28 base pairs upstream of the transcription start point, there was a sequence with strong homology to a sequence preceding the purE gene of M. thermoautotrophicum.