2 publications

2 publications

Chemical Conversion of a DNA-Binding Protein into a Site-Specific Nuclease

Sigman, D.S.

Science 1987, 237, 1197-1201, 10.1126/science.2820056

The tryptophan gene (trp) repressor of Escherichia coli has been converted into a site-specific nuclease by covalently attaching it to the 1,10-phenanthroline-copper complex. In its cuprous form, the coordination complex with hydrogen peroxide as a coreactant cleaves DNA by oxidatively attacking the deoxyribose moiety. The chemistry for the attachment of 1,10-phenanthroline to the trp repressor involves modification of lysyl residues with iminothiolane followed by alkylation of the resulting sulfhydryl groups with 5-iodoacetamido-1,10-phenanthroline. The modified trp repressor cleaves the operators of aroH and trpEDCBA upon the addition of cupric ion and thiol in a reaction dependent on the corepressor L-tryptophan. Scission was restricted to the binding site for the repressor, defined by deoxyribonuclease I footprinting. Since DNA-binding proteins have recognition sequences approximately 20 base pairs long, the nucleolytic activities derived from them could be used to isolate long DNA fragments for sequencing or chromosomal mapping.


Metal: Cu
Ligand type: Phenanthroline
Anchoring strategy: Covalent
Optimization: ---
Reaction: Oxidative cleavage
Max TON: <1
ee: ---
PDB: ---
Notes: Engineered sequence specificity

Conversion of a Helix-Turn-Helix Motif Sequence-Specific DNA Binding Protein into a Site-Specific DNA Cleavage Agent

Ebright, R.H.; Gunasekeram, A.

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 1990, 87, 2882-2886, 10.1073/pnas.87.8.2882

Escherichia coli catabolite gene activator protein (CAP) is a helix-turn-helix motif sequence-specific DNA binding protein [de Crombrugghe, B., Busby, S. & Buc, H. (1984) Science 224, 831-838; and Pabo, C. & Sauer, R. (1984) Annu. Rev. Biochem. 53, 293-321]. In this work, CAP has been converted into a site-specific DNA cleavage agent by incorporation of the chelator 1,10-phenanthroline at amino acid 10 of the helix-turn-helix motif. [(N-Acetyl-5-amino-1,10-phenanthroline)-Cys178]CAP binds to a 22-base-pair DNA recognition site with Kobs = 1 x 10(8) M-1. In the presence of Cu(II) and reducing agent, [(N-acetyl-5-amino-1,10-phenanthroline)-Cys178]CAP cleaves DNA at four adjacent nucleotides on each DNA strand within the DNA recognition site. The DNA cleavage reaction has been demonstrated using 40-base-pair and 7164-base-pair DNA substrates. The DNA cleavage reaction is not inhibited by dam methylation of the DNA substrate. Such semisynthetic site-specific DNA cleavage agents have potential applications in chromosome mapping, cloning, and sequencing.


Metal: Cu
Ligand type: Phenanthroline
Anchoring strategy: Covalent
Optimization: ---
Reaction: Oxidative cleavage
Max TON: <1
ee: ---
PDB: ---
Notes: Engineered sequence specificity