I have always been fascinated by nucleic acids that can perform chemical reactions. When I came to WVU I knew I wanted to venture into a bizarre area of biochemistry: catalytic DNA molecules, known as "DNAzymes", that cleave RNA with high specificity.
The 10-23 DNAzyme was the first catalytic DNA described. Yet after almost 40 years of research the structural basis for its ability to cleave RNA remains murky. Our new study published in the Nature family journal Communications Chemistry sheds new light on how these enzymes define their RNA targets and use Mg2+ metal cofactors to cleave them.
Evan Cramer (3rd year Ph.D. student) is the lead author on the paper. He obtained high resolution crystals to solve the structure, and validated its interpretation through biochemical assays.
Sarah Starcovic (1st year Ph.D. student) obtained our first 10-23 DNAzyme crystals as an undergraduate summer fellow.
Undergraduate student Beka Avey helped with our biochemical assays. Structural biology was done in collaboration with the NE-CAT beamline housed in the APS at Argonne National Lab. Special thanks to Ali Kaya for all his assistance and support during the remote X-ray data collection!
You can read more about the science in Nature's blog series "behind the paper".