An investigation of the functional domains of the aspartate kinase and homoserine dehydrogenase activities in these organisms was made using Superfamily software.
Undergraduate research and bioinformatics students could compare the sequences and structures of the maize enzymes with respect to the NADPH binding domains (amino acids 568-573), a KFGG region (amino acids 98-101) near the N-terminus of aspartate kinase domains and an interface region (amino acids 342-566 and 339-563, respectively; Muehlbauer et al., 1994) with the bifunctional enzymes I and II in Arabidopsis.
Expression of an aspartate kinase homoserine dehydrogenase gene is subject to specific spatial and temporal regulation in vegetative tissues, flowers and developing seeds.