Postreplication repair functions in gap-filling of a daughter strand on replication of damaged DNA. The yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae Rad18 protein plays a pivotal role in the process together with the Rad6 protein. Here, we have cloned a human homologue of RAD18, hRAD18. It maps on chromosome 3p24-25, where deletions are often found in lung, breast, ovary, and testis cancers. In vivo, hRad18 ...

Artificial transcription factors (ATFs) and genomic nucleases based on a DNA binding platform consisting of multiple zinc finger domains are currently being developed for clinical applications. However, no genome-wide investigations into their binding specificity have been performed. We have created six-finger ATFs to target two different 18 nt regions of the human SOX2 promoter; each ATF is co...

Fruit fly FTZ-F1, silkworm BmFTZ-F1, and mouse embryonal long terminal repeat-binding protein are members of the nuclear hormone receptor superfamily, which recognizes the same sequence, 5'-PyCAAGGPyCPu-3'. Among these proteins, a 30-amino-acid basic region abutting the C-terminal end of the zinc finger motif, designated the FTZ-F1 box, is conserved. Gel mobility shift competition by various mu...

Recent research has revealed the presence of ubiquitin-binding domains in the Y family polymerases. The ubiquitin-binding zinc finger (UBZ) domain of human polymerase η is vital for its regulation, localization, and function. Here, we elucidate structural and functional features of the non-canonical UBZ motif of Saccharomyces cerevisiae pol η. Characterization of pol η mutants confirms the impo...

During synthesis of yeast ribosome, a large complex, called the 90S pre-ribosome or the small subunit processome, is assembled on the nascent precursor rRNA and mediates early processing of 18S rRNA. The Utp23 protein and snR30 H/ACA snoRNA are two conserved components of 90S pre-ribosomes. Utp23 contains a degenerate PIN nuclease domain followed by a long C-terminal tail and associates specifi...

Modular analysis of procedures using summaries is a key technique to improve scalability of software model checking. Existing software model checkers do not fully exploit procedural structure for modular analysis. In the SLAM project, modular analysis using procedure summaries is done on a Boolean Program model, which contains only boolean types. We extend Boolean Programs to include reference ...

HIV-1 integrase catalyzes the insertion of the viral genome into chromosomal DNA. We characterized the structural determinants of the 3'-processing reaction specificity--the first reaction of the integration process--at the DNA-binding level. We found that the integrase N-terminal domain, containing a pseudo zinc-finger motif, plays a key role, at least indirectly, in the formation of specific ...