The nucleotide sequence of the bacteriophage T5 Bg/II-BamHI fragment (4,835 bp in length) known to carry a gene encoding the LTF protein which forms the phage L-shaped tail fibers was determined. It was shown to contain an open reading frame for 1,396 amino acid residues that corresponds to a protein of 147.8 kDa. The coding region of ltf gene is preceded by a typical Shine-Dalgarno sequence. Downstream from the ltf gene there is a strong transcription terminator. Data bank analysis of the LTF protein sequence reveals 55.1% identity to the hypothetical protein ORF 401 of bacteriophage λ in a segment of 118 amino acids overlap.
