Ribozyme and the mechanisms that underlie RNA catalysis

2016, Volume 10, Issue 2

Abstract

Keywords

Related Research

Frontiers of Chemical Science and Engineering >> 2016, Volume 10, Issue 2 doi: 10.1007/s11705-016-1558-2

Ribozyme and the mechanisms that underlie RNA catalysis

Cancer Research UK Nucleic Acid Structure Research Group, MSI/WTB Complex, The University of Dundee, Dundee DD1 5EH, UK

Accepted: 2016-02-18 Available online: 2016-05-19

HTML20 PDF 2 Collect 0

Next Previous

Abstract

Ribozymes are widespread, and catalyze some extremely important reactions in the cell. Mechanistically most fall into one of two classes, using either metal ions or general acid-base catalysis. The nucleolytic ribozymes fall into the latter class, mostly using nucleobases. A sub-set of these use a combination of guanine base plus adenine acid to catalyze the cleavage reaction. New ribozymes are still being discovered at regular intervals and we can speculate on the potential existence of ribozymes that catalyze chemistry beyond phosphoryl transfer reactions, perhaps using small-molecule coenzymes.

Keywords

RNA catalysis ; RNA structure ; catalytic mechanism

Related Research