Ascidian mitochondrial code


The ascidian mitochondrial code is a genetic code found in the mitochondria of Ascidia.

Code

Bases: adenine, cytosine, guanine and thymine or uracil.
Amino acids: Alanine, Arginine, Asparagine, Aspartic acid, Cysteine, Glutamic acid, Glutamine, Glycine, Histidine, Isoleucine, Leucine, Lysine, Methionine, Phenylalanine, Proline, Serine, Threonine, Tryptophan, Tyrosine, Valine

Systematic range and comments

There is evidence from a phylogenetically diverse sample of tunicates that AGA and AGG code for glycine. In other organisms, AGA/AGG code for either arginine or serine and in vertebrate mitochondria they code a STOP. Evidence for glycine translation of AGA/AGG was first found in 1993 in Pyura stolonifera and Halocynthia roretzi. It was then confirmed by tRNA sequencing and sequencing whole mitochondrial genomes.

Alternative initiation codons