nmt2 of fission yeast: a second thiamine-repressible gene co-ordinately regulated with nmt1.

We previously described a screen for thiamine-repressible genes in Schizosaccharomyces pombe and reported on one such gene, nmt1, required for thiamine biosynthesis. Here we describe a second gene, nmt2, recovered in the same screen. Disruption of nmt2 also resulted in thiamine auxotrophy, indicating a role for the nmt2 gene product in thiamine biosynthesis. Both genes are highly transcribed in minimal medium and repressed in medium containing thiamine, and nuclear 'run-on' experiments confirm that expression in both cases is controlled by the rate of transcription initiation. The virtually identical kinetics of induction and repression suggest that the two genes are co-ordinately regulated. Sequence comparison of the two promoters reveals a canonical TATA box, downstream of which is a perfectly conserved 11 bp element. Transcript mapping experiments show that transcription initiation of both genes is centred on this element.