Question

A transformed bacterium with human gene fails to produce desired protein. The reason could be

• A. Amino acid codons for human and bacteria differ.
• B. The bacterial promoter gene cannot induce transcription of human gene.
• C. Human protein is formed but degraded by bacteria.
• D. Human gene may have intron which bacteria cannot process.

Answer 1

Answer: (D)

Human gene may have intron which bacteria cannot process.

Human genes have introns, the intervening non coding sequences which are removed by post transcriptional modification of hnRNA. Bacterial genes do not have introns and bacteria lack the intron splicing machinery. The transformed bacterium with human gene, fails to produce desired protein due to inability of splicing the introns to produce the mature mRNA from the hnRNA. Correct answer is D.