Medical Definition of Cassette mechanism
1.
Term used for genes such as the a and _ genes that determine mating type in yeast, either one or the other is active.
In this gene conversion process, a double stranded nuclease makes a cut at a specific point in the MAT locus, the old gene is replaced with a copy of a silent gene from one or other flanking region and the new copy becomes active. As the process involves replacing one ready made construct with another in an active slot it is called a cassette mechanism.
This entry appears with permission from the Dictionary of Cell and Molecular Biology
(11 Mar 2008)
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