Figure 5
From: Conservation and evolutionary divergence in the activity of receptor-regulated smads
Swapping in the MH2 domain from XSmad2 increases the inductive activity of NvSmad2/3 . (A) Design of chimeras swapping XSmad2 domains into NvSmad2/3. (B) Western blot showing tagged protein translation levels in injected and uninjected whole embryos (L = Benchmark protein ladder, showing the 58-kDa band). XSmad2, XSmad3, NvSmad2/3, MH1 chimera, and MH2 chimera show equal levels of translation, whereas the uninjected embryos show none. The linker chimera (‘Link’) shows slightly lower levels of translation. Note, XSmad3 was injected and included in translation blot to check continuity with previous experiments, but was not used in subsequent animal cap analyses. Animal caps injected with XSmad2, NvSmad2, MH1 chimera, linker chimera, or MH2 chimera mRNA at the two-cell stage show elevated expression of genes downstream in the Activin/Nodal pathway. Real time quantitative PCR shows fold induction levels of Activin/Nodal pathway members on the Y-axis. (C) Class I markers goosecoid and ADMP. (D) Class II markers chordin, noggin, follistatin, and eomesodermin. (E) Class III markers mixer, mix.2, and sox17α. (F) Class IV marker Xbra.