Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
Pivot Concepts:   Target Concepts:
Query: EC:3.1.26.4 (RNase H)
 2,751 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Substitution of the conserved Asp-443 residue of HIV-1 reverse transcriptase by asparagine specifically suppressed the ribonuclease H activity of the enzyme without affecting the reverse transcriptase activity, suggesting involvement of this ionizable residue at the ribonuclease H active site. An analogous asparagine substitution of the Asp-498 residue yielded an unstable enzyme that was difficult to enzymatically characterize. However, the instability caused by the Asn-498 mutation was relieved by the introduction of a second distal Asn-443 substitution, yielding an enzyme with wild type reverse transcriptase activity, but lacking ribonuclease H activity.
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PMID:Site-directed mutagenesis of the conserved Asp-443 and Asp-498 carboxy-terminal residues of HIV-1 reverse transcriptase. 169 2

The human immunodeficiency virus 1 (HIV-1) reverse transcriptase (RT) is a protein of 66 kDa, p66, which contains two domains, an amino-terminal DNA polymerase and an RNase H at the carboxy terminus of the molecule. In order to characterize the mode of action of the RNase H, two previously described mutant enzymes were used, with substitutions in the highly conserved histidine 539, which was mutated to the neutral amino acid asparagine and to the negatively charged aspartate. The purified wild-type (wt) and mutant (mt) enzyme activities are analyzed here using RNA-DNA hybrids consisting of in vitro transcribed RNA that harbors the polypurine tract (PPT) from HIV-1 and DNA oligonucleotides complementary to the PPT or to other regions of the RNA. Analysis of the radioactively labeled RNA of these model hybrids after RNase H treatment indicates that both, wt and mt enzymes, are capable of cleaving the RNA in an endonucleolytic manner. The mt enzymes exhibit a severely reduced exonuclease activity. They are more sensitive towards salt and competition with excess of unlabeled hybrid, suggesting a reduced substrate binding affinity. DNA elongation by the RT is coupled with RNA hydrolysis by the 3'-5' exonuclease of the wt RNase H. The RNase Hmt of the mt enzymes, however, does not exhibit such processive 3'-5' exonuclease activity during DNA synthesis but gives rise to sporadic endonucleolytic cuts, whereas the RT is not affected. The endonuclease activities of the RNase H mt enzymes exhibit cleavage preferences in the absence or presence of DNA synthesis different from those of the wt enzyme. They cannot recognize specific sequences required to generate a PPT-primer and therefore cannot initiate plus-strand DNA synthesis in vitro at the 3' end of the PPT, which is essential for viral replication.
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PMID:Mutations of a conserved residue within HIV-1 ribonuclease H affect its exo- and endonuclease activities. 171 5

The role of the conserved Asp134 residue in Escherichia coli ribonuclease HI, which is located at the center of the alpha V helix and lies close to the active site, was analyzed by means of site-directed random mutagenesis. Mutant rnhA genes encoding proteins with ribonuclease H activities were screened by their ability to suppress the ribonuclease-H-dependent, temperature-sensitive growth phenotype of E. coli strain MIC3001. Based on the DNA sequences, nine mutant proteins were predicted to have ribonuclease H activity in vivo. All of these mutant proteins were purified to homogeneity and examined for enzymic activity and protein stability. Among them, only the mutant proteins [D134H]RNase H and [D134N]RNase H were shown to have considerable ribonuclease H activities. Determination of the kinetic parameters revealed that replacement of Asp134 by amino acid residues other than asparagine and histidine dramatically decreased the enzymic activity without seriously affecting the substrate binding. Determination of the CD spectra indicated that none of the mutations seriously affected secondary and tertiary structure. The protein stability was determined from the thermal denaturation curves. All mutant proteins were more stable than the wild-type protein. Such stabilization effects would be a result of a reduction in the negative charge repulsion between Asp134 and the active-site residues, and/or an enhancement of the stability of the alpha V helix. These results strongly suggest that Asp134 does not contribute to the maintenance of the molecular architecture but the carboxyl oxygen at its delta 1 position impacts catalysis.
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PMID:Investigating the role of conserved residue Asp134 in Escherichia coli ribonuclease HI by site-directed random mutagenesis. 812 23

Reverse transcriptases (RTs) are found in a wide variety of mobile genetic elements including viruses, retrotransposons, and infectious organellar introns. An invariant triad of aspartates is thought to be required for the catalytic function of RTs. We generated RT mutants in the yeast retrotransposon Ty1, changing each of these active-site aspartates to asparagine or glutamate. All but one of the mutants lacked detectable polymerase activity. The novel exception, D(211)N, retained near wild-type in vitro polymerase activity within virus-like particles but failed to carry out in vivo transposition. For this mutant, minus-strand synthesis is impaired and formation of the plus-strand strong-stop intermediate is eliminated. Intragenic second-site suppressor mutations of the transposition defect map to the RNase H domain of the enzyme. Our results demonstrate that one of the three active-site aspartates in a retrotransposon RT is not catalytically critical. This implies a basic difference in the polymerase active-site geometry of Ty1 and human immunodeficiency virus RT and shows that subtle mutations in one domain can cause dramatic functional effects on a distant domain of the same enzyme.
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PMID:A Ty1 reverse transcriptase active-site aspartate mutation blocks transposition but not polymerization. 1141