Roth Adam, Breaker Ronald R
Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06520-8103, USA.
Annu Rev Biochem. 2009;78:305-34. doi: 10.1146/annurev.biochem.78.070507.135656.
The cellular concentrations of certain metabolites are assiduously monitored to achieve appropriate levels of gene expression. Although proteins have long been known to act as sensors in this capacity, metabolite-binding RNAs, or riboswitches, also play an important role. More than 20 distinct classes of riboswitches have been identified to date, and insights to the molecular recognition strategies of a significant subset of these have been provided by detailed structural studies. This diverse set of metabolite-sensing RNAs is found to exploit a variety of distinct mechanisms to regulate genes that are fundamental to metabolism.
为了实现适当水平的基因表达,某些代谢物的细胞浓度受到严格监测。尽管长期以来人们都知道蛋白质在这种能力中可充当传感器,但代谢物结合RNA或核糖开关也发挥着重要作用。迄今为止,已鉴定出20多种不同类别的核糖开关,详细的结构研究为其中很大一部分的分子识别策略提供了见解。人们发现,这一多样的代谢物感应RNA集合利用多种不同机制来调控对新陈代谢至关重要的基因。