Klimasauskas Saulius, Weinhold Elmar
Laboratory of Biological DNA Modification, Institute of Biotechnology, LT-02241 Vilnius, Lithuania.
Trends Biotechnol. 2007 Mar;25(3):99-104. doi: 10.1016/j.tibtech.2007.01.006. Epub 2007 Jan 24.
AdoMet-dependent methyltransferases catalyze highly specific methyl group transfers from the ubiquitous cofactor S-adenosyl-L-methionine to a multitude of biological targets in the cell. Recently, DNA methyltransferases have been used for the sequence-specific, covalent attachment of larger chemical groups to plasmid and bacteriophage DNA using two classes of synthetic AdoMet analogs. These synthetic cofactors, in combination with the myriad AdoMet-dependent methyltransferases available in nature, provide new molecular tools for precise, targeted functionalization and labeling of large natural DNAs and, in all likelihood, RNAs and proteins. This paves the way for numerous novel applications in the functional analysis of biological methylation, biotechnology and medical diagnostics.
依赖腺苷甲硫氨酸的甲基转移酶催化从普遍存在的辅因子S-腺苷-L-甲硫氨酸到细胞中多种生物靶点的高度特异性甲基转移。最近，DNA甲基转移酶已被用于使用两类合成腺苷甲硫氨酸类似物将更大的化学基团序列特异性、共价连接到质粒和噬菌体DNA上。这些合成辅因子，与自然界中可用的无数依赖腺苷甲硫氨酸的甲基转移酶相结合，为大型天然DNA以及很可能的RNA和蛋白质的精确、靶向功能化和标记提供了新的分子工具。这为生物甲基化功能分析、生物技术和医学诊断中的众多新应用铺平了道路。
