Nature Communications (Aug 2021)

Characterization of a triad of genes in cyanophage S-2L sufficient to replace adenine by 2-aminoadenine in bacterial DNA

  • Dariusz Czernecki,
  • Frédéric Bonhomme,
  • Pierre-Alexandre Kaminski,
  • Marc Delarue

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-25064-x
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 12, no. 1
pp. 1 – 9

Abstract

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The cyanophage S-2L incorporates 2-aminoadenine (Z) instead of adenine into its DNA, which still pairs with thymine forming a triple hydrogen bond. Here, the authors identify a third gene mazZ located between purZ and datZ that is required for 2-aminoadenine biosynthesis and determine the crystal structures of MazZ and PurZ. They further show that co-expression of these three genes in E.coli enables 2-aminoadenine incorporation into the bacterial genome.