Intermittent expression of BmFTZ-F1, a member of the nuclear hormone receptor superfamily during development of the silkworm Bombyx mori

BmFTZ-F1 is a sequence-specific DNA-binding factor in the silkworm Bombyx mori sharing similar biochemical characteristics with Drosophila FTZ-F1, a member of the nuclear hormone receptor superfamily. Using DNA sequence homology with FTZ-F1 and information on tryptic peptide sequences of BmFTZ-F1, we isolated a cDNA encoding for BmFTZ-F1. Amino acid sequences in the zinc finger DNA-binding region and the putative ligand-binding domain of BmFTZ-F1 showed strong similarity to not only FTZ-F1 but also its mammalian homologues, LRH-1, ELP, and Ad4BP, suggesting the importance of each region for the function of these proteins. Northern blot analyses of RNA isolated from the middle and posterior silk glands and fat bodies showed that a 6.1-kb BmFTZ-F1 mRNA is present in all tissues so far examined. Expression of BmFTZ-F1 mRNA is intermittent, being high during larval molting and both the larval-pupal and the pupal-adult transformations. Injection of 20-hydroxyecdysone at the third day of the 5th instar larvae induced BmFTZ-F1 mRNA in the posterior silk gland after 24 hr. When 5th instar silk glands were cultured in vitro, BmFTZ-F1 mRNA was induced by a 6-hr exposure to 20-hydroxyecdysone followed by 6 hr in hormone-free medium. These results suggest that BmFTZ-F1 is inducible by decline in the ecdysteroid titer and may play an important role in the development of the silkworm as a transcription factor.