Nucleotide composition in protein-coding and non-coding DNA in the zygomycete Phycomyces blakesleeanus

Abstract

The zygomycete Phycomyces blakesleeanus has a 30 Mb genome with a 35% content of guanine and cytosine (GC). We determined the GC content in Phycomyces genes and fragments of genes available in public databases, the frequency of nucleotides in each codon position, and the codon usage. We observed a difference of 18% between the GC content of protein-coding and non-coding DNA. This large difference allowed the visualization of protein-coding DNA by plotting the GC content along a segment of Phycomyces DNA. We have identified a high GC DNA segment linked to the pyrG genes of the zygomycete genera Phycomyces, Mucor, and Blakeslea that corresponds to the 3' end of the gene responsible for the protein kinase C.