The type 1 human immunodeficiency virus Tat binding protein is a transcriptional activator belonging to an additional family of evolutionarily conserved genes.

The type 1 human immunodeficiency virus Tat protein is a powerful transcriptional activator when bound to an RNA structure (TAR) present at the extreme 5' terminus of viral mRNA. Since transcriptional activation requires binding of Tat to RNA, it has been suggested that Tat enhances initiation or elongation through a direct interaction with cellular transcription factors. Here we show through protein fusion experiments that the previously identified cellular Tat binding protein, TBP-1, although unable to bind DNA, is a strong transcriptional activator when brought into proximity of several promoter elements. Transcriptional activity depends upon the integrity of at least two highly conserved domains: one resembling a nucleotide-binding motif and the other motif common to proteins with helicase activity. Our studies further reveal that TBP-1 represents one member of a large, highly conserved gene family that encodes proteins demonstrating strong amino acid conservation across species. Finally, we identified a second family member that, although 77% similar to TBP-1, does not activate transcription from the promoters examined. This finding, together with the observation that TBP-1 does not activate each promoter examined, suggests that this gene family may encode promoter-specific transcriptional activators.