The cell cycles of the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae and the fission yeast, Schizosaccharomyces pombe are currently the best understood of all eukaryotes. Studies in these two evolutionarily divergent organisms have identified common control mechanisms, which have provided paradigms for our understanding of the eukaryotic cell cycle. This chapter provides an overview of our current knowledge of the molecules and mechanisms that regulate the mitotic cell cycle in these two yeasts.
