In this report the phenotypic effects of systematic site-directed mutations in the fission yeast RNA pol II carboxy terminal domain (CTD) are investigated. Remarkably, we find that alterations in CTD structure and/or phosphorylation result in distinct phenotypic changes related to morphogenetic control. A hypothesis based upon the concepts of "informational entropy" and "algorithmic transformation" is developed to explicate/rationalize these results.
Keywords: RNA polymerase II; algorithmic transformation; carboxy terminal domain; cell division; fission yeast; morphogenesis.