One member of the tRNA(Glu) gene family in yeast codes for a minor GAGtRNA(Glu) species and is associated with several short transposable elements.

During characterization of the whole tRNA-(Glu) family from the yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, we isolated one cosmid clone bearing a tRNA(Glu) gene copy that is deviant from the major tRNA(Glu3) gene members in only five positions. This divergent tRNA-(Glu) is a minor species and is represented by a single gene copy. One of the nucleotide exchanges concerns the anticodon which is modified from T-T-C in the tRNA(Glu3) gene to C-T-C which implies that this tRNA serves the codon triplet G-A-G. Two other minor yeast tRNA species have been reported which appear to be particularly designed for the translation of those codons that have a G in its third (Wobble) position. The low abundance of such minor tRNA species correlates positively to the low occurrence of most of the N-N-G codons in yeast. Furthermore, the GAGtRNA-(Glu) locus represents another case of the general phenomenon in which the majority of the tRNA genes in yeast are associated with one or several transposable elements forming complex patterns. In this particular case, divergent segments of delta and tau are present in the 5' flanking region of the tRNA gene and arranged in a novel configuration. The sequence data lend support to the view that tau is not an evolutionary young element as was earlier anticipated.