Structure of a dimeric crenarchaeal Cas6 enzyme with an atypical active site for CRISPR RNA processing.

ABSTRACT: The competition between viruses and hosts is played out in all branches of life. Many prokaryotes have an adaptive immune system termed 'CRISPR' (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) which is based on the capture of short pieces of viral DNA. The captured DNA is integrated into the genomic DNA of the organism flanked by direct repeats, transcribed and processed to generate crRNA (CRISPR RNA) that is loaded into a variety of effector complexes. These complexes carry out sequence-specific detection and destruction of invading mobile genetic elements. In the present paper, we report the structure and activity of a Cas6 (CRISPR-associated 6) enzyme (Sso1437) from Sulfolobus solfataricus responsible for the generation of unit-length crRNA species. The crystal structure rev

SUBMITTER: Reeks J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3652601 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature