SUMMARY We report the construction and analysis of 4,836 heterozygous diploid deletion mutants covering 98.4% of the fission yeast genome. This resource provides a powerful tool for biotechnological and eukaryotic cell biology research. Comprehensive gene dispensability comparisons with budding yeast, the first time such studies have been possible between two eukaryotes, revealed that 83% of single copy orthologues in the two yeasts had conserved dispensability. Gene dispensability differed for certain pathways between the two yeasts, including mitochondrial translation and cell cycle checkpoint control. We show that fission yeast has more essential genes than budding yeast and that essential genes are more likely than non-essential genes to be single copy, broadly conserved and to contain introns. Growth fitness analyses determined sets of haploinsufficient and haploproficient genes for fission yeast, and comparisons with budding yeast identified specific ribosomal proteins and RNA polymerase subunits, which may act more generally to regulate eukaryotic cell growth.

Gaf1 is the first GATA family zinc-finger transcription factor identified in Schizosaccharomyces pombe. Here, we report that Gaf1 functions as a negatively acting transcription factor of ste11+, delaying the entrance of cells exposed to transient nitrogen starvation into the meiotic cycle. gaf1Δ strains exhibited accelerated G1-arrest upon nitrogen starvation. Moreover, gaf1Δ mutation caused increased mating and sporulation frequency under both nitrogen-starved and unstarved conditions, while overexpression of gaf1+ led to a significant impairment of sporulation. By microarray analysis, we found that approximately 63% (116 genes) of the 183 genes up-regulated in unstarved gaf1Δ cells were nitrogen starvation-responsive genes, and furthermore that 25 genes among the genes up-regulated by gaf1Δ mutation are Ste11 targets (e.g., gpa1 +, ste4 +, spk1 +, ste11 +, and mei2 +). The phenotype caused by gaf1Δ mutation was masked by ste11Δ mutation, indicating that ste11+ is epistatic to gaf1+ with respect to sporulation efficiency, and accordingly that gaf1+ functions upstream of ste11+ in the signaling pathway governing sexual development. gaf1Δ strains showed accelerated ste11+ expression under nitrogen starvation and increased ste11+ expression even under normal conditions. Electrophoretic mobility shift assay analysis demonstrated that Gaf1 specifically binds to the canonical GATA motif (5′-HGATAR-3′) spanning from −371 to −366 in ste11+ promoter. Consequently, Gaf1 provides the prime example for negative regulation of ste11+ transcription through direct binding to a cis-acting motif of its promoter.

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The guinea pig is an appropriate small animal model for the short-term screening of countermeasures for cutaneous radiation injury (CRI).

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