Sequence and evolution of guinea pig preproinsulin DNA.

Abstract Guinea pig insulin exhibits an unusually high degree of divergence from the conserved insulins of other mammals. cDNA clones encoding guinea pig preproinsulin were isolated, and their nucleic acid sequences were determined. Comparisons of the nucleic acid sequence and its predicted amino acid sequence with sequences encoding insulins of other species revealed that the gene encoding guinea pig preproinsulin evolved from the same ancestral mammalian gene as other known mammalian insulin genes.