The Pribnow box (also known as the Pribnow-Schaller box) is a sequence of ''TATAAT'' of six

nucleotide Nucleotides are organic molecules consisting of a nucleoside and a phosphate. They serve as monomeric units of the nucleic acid polymers – deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and ribonucleic acid (RNA), both of which are essential biomolecu ...

s (

thymine Thymine () ( symbol T or Thy) is one of the four nucleobases in the nucleic acid of DNA that are represented by the letters G–C–A–T. The others are adenine, guanine, and cytosine. Thymine is also known as 5-methyluracil, a pyrimidin ...

adenine Adenine () ( symbol A or Ade) is a nucleobase (a purine derivative). It is one of the four nucleobases in the nucleic acid of DNA that are represented by the letters G–C–A–T. The three others are guanine, cytosine and thymine. Its deriv ...

, etc.) that is an essential part of a promoter site on DNA for transcription to occur in

bacteria Bacteria (; singular: bacterium) are ubiquitous, mostly free-living organisms often consisting of one biological cell. They constitute a large domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometres in length, bacteria were am ...

. It is an idealized or

consensus sequence In molecular biology and bioinformatics, the consensus sequence (or canonical sequence) is the calculated order of most frequent residues, either nucleotide or amino acid, found at each position in a sequence alignment. It serves as a simplified r ...

—that is, it shows the most frequently occurring base at each position in many promoters analyzed; individual promoters often vary from the consensus at one or more positions. It is also commonly called the -10 sequence, because it is centered roughly ten base pairs upstream from the site of initiation of transcription. The Pribnow box has a function similar to the TATA box that occurs in promoters in

eukaryote Eukaryotes () are organisms whose cells have a nucleus. All animals, plants, fungi, and many unicellular organisms, are Eukaryotes. They belong to the group of organisms Eukaryota or Eukarya, which is one of the three domains of life. Bacter ...

s and

archaea Archaea ( ; singular archaeon ) is a domain of single-celled organisms. These microorganisms lack cell nuclei and are therefore prokaryotes. Archaea were initially classified as bacteria, receiving the name archaebacteria (in the Archaeba ...

: it is recognized and bound by a subunit of

RNA polymerase In molecular biology, RNA polymerase (abbreviated RNAP or RNApol), or more specifically DNA-directed/dependent RNA polymerase (DdRP), is an enzyme that synthesizes RNA from a DNA template. Using the enzyme helicase, RNAP locally opens th ...

during initiation of transcription. This region of the DNA is also the first place where base pairs separate during prokaryotic transcription to allow access to the template strand. The AT-richness is important to allow this separation, since

and

are easier to break apart (not only due to fewer hydrogen bonds, but also due to weaker base stacking effects). It is named after David Pribnow and

Heinz Schaller The H. J. Heinz Company is an American food processing company headquartered at One PPG Place in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The company was founded by Henry J. Heinz in 1869. Heinz manufactures thousands of food products in plants on six conti ...

Probability of occurrence of each nucleotide in ''E. coli''

In fiction

The term "Pribnow box" is used in episode 13 of ''

Neon Genesis Evangelion , also known simply as ''Evangelion'' or ''Eva'', is a Japanese mecha anime television series produced by Gainax and animated by Tatsunoko, directed by Hideaki Anno and broadcast on TV Tokyo from October 1995 to March 1996. ''Evangelion ...

'', in reference to the chamber holding simulation Evangelions for testing purposes.

References

Regulatory sequences {{genetics-stub

Probability of occurrence of each nucleotide in ''E. coli''

In fiction

See also

References