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

nucleotide Nucleotides are Organic compound, organic molecules composed of a nitrogenous base, a pentose sugar and a phosphate. They serve as monomeric units of the nucleic acid polymers – deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and ribonucleic acid (RNA), both o ...

s (

thymine Thymine () (symbol T or Thy) is one of the four nucleotide bases 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 pyrimidine ...

adenine Adenine (, ) (nucleoside#List of nucleosides and corresponding nucleobases, symbol A or Ade) is a purine nucleotide base that is found in DNA, RNA, and Adenosine triphosphate, ATP. Usually a white crystalline subtance. The shape of adenine is ...

, etc.) that is an essential part of a promoter site on

DNA Deoxyribonucleic acid (; DNA) is a polymer composed of two polynucleotide chains that coil around each other to form a double helix. The polymer carries genetic instructions for the development, functioning, growth and reproduction of al ...

for transcription to occur in

bacteria Bacteria (; : bacterium) are ubiquitous, mostly free-living organisms often consisting of one Cell (biology), biological cell. They constitute a large domain (biology), domain of Prokaryote, prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micr ...

. It is an idealized or

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

—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 or element, 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 The eukaryotes ( ) constitute the Domain (biology), domain of Eukaryota or Eukarya, organisms whose Cell (biology), cells have a membrane-bound cell nucleus, nucleus. All animals, plants, Fungus, fungi, seaweeds, and many unicellular organisms ...

s and

archaea Archaea ( ) is a Domain (biology), domain of organisms. Traditionally, Archaea only included its Prokaryote, prokaryotic members, but this has since been found to be paraphyletic, as eukaryotes are known to have evolved from archaea. Even thou ...

: 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 catalyzes the chemical reactions that synthesize RNA from a DNA template. Using the e ...

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 bond In chemistry, a hydrogen bond (H-bond) is a specific type of molecular interaction that exhibits partial covalent character and cannot be described as a purely electrostatic force. It occurs when a hydrogen (H) atom, Covalent bond, covalently b ...

s, but also due to weaker base stacking effects). It is named after David Pribnow and Heinz Schaller.

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

In fiction

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