Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Harvard University, 12 Oxford Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, United States.
J Am Chem Soc. 2021 Sep 1;143(34):13463-13472. doi: 10.1021/jacs.1c05952. Epub 2021 Aug 23.
Radicals in biology, once thought to all be bad actors, are now known to play a central role in many enzymatic reactions. Of the known radical-based enzymes, ribonucleotide reductases (RNRs) are pre-eminent as they are essential in the biology of all organisms by providing the building blocks and controlling the fidelity of DNA replication and repair. Intense examination of RNRs has led to the development of new tools and a guiding framework for the study of radicals in biology, pointing the way to future frontiers in radical enzymology.
生物学中的自由基,曾一度被认为都是有害的,但现在已知它们在许多酶促反应中起着核心作用。在已知的基于自由基的酶中,核苷酸还原酶(RNRs)尤为突出,因为它们通过提供构建块和控制 DNA 复制和修复的保真度,是所有生物体生物学中必不可少的。对 RNRs 的深入研究导致了新工具的开发和生物学中自由基研究的指导框架的建立,为自由基酶学的未来前沿指明了方向。