T5 5'-3' exonuclease is a member of a homologous group of 5' nucleases which require divalent metal co-factors. Structural and biochemical studies suggest that single-stranded DNA substrates thread through a helical arch or hole in the protein, thus bringing the phosphodiester backbone into close proximity with the active site metal co-factors. In addition to the expected use of Mg(2+), Mn(2+) ...

Termination of RNA polymerase II (RNAPII) transcription of protein-coding genes occurs downstream of cleavage/polyadenylation sites. According to the "torpedo" model, the 5'-3' exonuclease Rat1p/Xrn2p attacks the newly formed 5' end of the cleaved pre-mRNA, causing the still transcribing RNAPII to terminate. Here we demonstrate a similar role of S. cerevisiae Rat1p within the gene body. We find...

The N-glycosidic bond can be hydrolyzed spontaneously or by glycosylases during removal of damaged bases by the base excision repair pathway, leading to the formation of highly mutagenic apurinic/apyrimidinic (AP) sites. Organisms encode for evolutionarily conserved repair machinery, including specific AP endonucleases that cleave the DNA backbone 5' to the AP site to prime further DNA repair s...

3'-5' exonucleases are frequently found to be associated to polymerases or helicases domains in the same enzyme or could function as autonomous entities. Here we uncovered that Candida albicans Pif1 (CaPif1) displays a 3'-5' exonuclease activity besides its main helicase activity. These two latter activities appear to reside on the same polypeptide and the new exonuclease activity could be mapp...

Nucleases play important roles in all DNA transactions, including replication, repair, and recombination. Many different nucleases from bacterial and eukaryotic organisms have been identified and functionally characterized. However, our knowledge about the nucleases from Archaea, the third domain of life, is still limited. We searched for 3'-5' exonuclease activity in the hyperthermophilic arch...

Genotoxic agents that cause double-strand breaks (DSBs) often generate damage at the break termini. Processing enzymes, including nucleases and polymerases, must remove damaged bases and/or add new bases before completion of repair. Artemis is a nuclease involved in mammalian nonhomologous end joining (NHEJ), but in Saccharomyces cerevisiae the nucleases and polymerases involved in NHEJ pathway...

TatD is an evolutionarily conserved protein with thousands of homologues in all kingdoms of life. It has been suggested that TatD participates in DNA fragmentation during apoptosis in eukaryotic cells. However, the cellular functions and biochemical properties of TatD in bacterial and non-apoptotic eukaryotic cells remain elusive. Here we show that Escherichia coli TatD is a Mg(2+)-dependent 3'...

Family D DNA polymerases (polDs) have been implicated as the major replicative polymerase in archaea, excluding the Crenarchaeota branch, and bear little sequence homology to other DNA polymerase families. Here we report a detailed kinetic analysis of nucleotide incorporation and exonuclease activity for a Family D DNA polymerase from Thermococcus sp. 9°N. Pre-steady-state single-turnover nucle...

The DNA polymerase from Spodoptera littoralis nucleopolyhedrovirus (SpliNPV) was expressed in, and purified from, prokaryotic and eukaryotic expression systems. While less protein was obtained from the E. coli expression system, SpliNPV DNAPOL purified from E. coli displayed similar biochemical characteristics to DNAPOL expressed in, and subsequently purified from, insect cells (Sf9) using a ba...