Nucleotide sequence and characteristics of a Ty element from yeast

We have determined the nucleotide sequence of a complete yeast Ty element (Ty-pY109) which is located near a tRNA(Lys1) gene. The element is 5912 bp in length; the internal domain is flanked by two identical delta sequences of 331 bp. Ty-pY109 contains two large open reading frames (ORFs) which overlap by 38 bp; the putative proteins consist of 440 and 1328 amino acid residues, respectively. The organisation of the coding sequences in Ty resembles that found in retroviral proviruses and the copia-like elements in Drosophila. Partial homologies have been found between Ty-ORF1 and tnpA from Tn3, and Ty-ORF2 and a reverse transcriptase-like domain (1,2).