Functional studies of the Yeast Mediator Tail Module Subunits

The yeast Mediator complex can be divided into three modules, designated Head, Middle and Tail. Tail comprises the Med2, Med3, Med5, Med15 and Med16 protein subunits, which are all encoded by genes that are individually non-essential for viability. In cells lacking Med16, Tail is displaced from Head and Middle. However, inactivation of MED5/MED15 and MED15/MED16 are synthetically lethal, indicating that Tail performs essential functions as a separate complex even when it is not bound to Middle and Head. We have used the N-Degron method to create temperature sensitive (ts) mutants in the Mediator tail subunits Med5, Med15 and Med16 to study the immediate effects on global gene expression when each subunit is individually inactivated, and when MED5/15 or MED15/16 are inactivated together. All Degron constructs were expressed from their normal chromosomal location under the control of their respective endogenous promoters. We isolated RNA from each strain as early as 45 minutes after changing from the permissive to the restrictive growth conditions to minimize possible secondary effects on gene expression that are not directly caused by the Degron construct(s).