Microarray data analyses of yeast RNA Pol I subunit RPA12 deletion strain

The ribosomal RNA (rRNA) biosynthesis is the most energy consuming process in all living cells and the majority of total transcription activity is dedicated for synthesizing rRNA. The cells may adjust the synthesis of rRNA with the availability of resources. rRNA is mainly synthesized by RNA polymerase I that is composed of 14 subunits. Deletion of RPA12, 14, 39 and 49 are viable. RPA12 is a very small protein (13.6 kDa), and the amount of protein in the cells is very high (12,000 molecules per cell), but the role of this protein is unknown in other cellular metabolic processes (Kulak et al., 2014 [1]). RPA12 consists of two zinc-binding domains and it is required for the termination of rRNA synthesis (Mullem et al., 2002 [2]). Deletions of RPA12 in Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Schizosaccharomyces pombe cause a conditional growth defect (Nogi et al., 1993 [3]). In S. pombe, C-terminal deletion behaves like wild-type (Imazawa et al., 2001 [4]). This prompted us to investigate in detail the physiological role of RPA12 in S. cerevisiae, we performed the microarray of rpa12 ∆ strain and deposited into Gene Expression Omnibus under GSE68731. The analysis of microarray data revealed that the expression of major cellular metabolism genes is high. The amino acid biosynthesis, nonpolar lipid biosynthesis and glucose metabolic genes are highly expressed. The analyses also revealed that the rpa12 ∆ cells have an uncontrolled synthesis of cell metabolites, so RPA12 could be a master regulator for whole cellular metabolism.