Friday, December 1, 2017

Synthetic transcription elongation factors license transcription across repressive chromatin

Graham S. Erwin, Matthew P. Grieshop, Asfa Ali, Jun Qi, Matthew Lawlor, Deepak Kumar, Istaq Ahmad, Anna McNally, Natalia Teider, Katie Worringer, Rajeev Sivasankaran, Deeba N. Syed, Asuka Eguchi, Md. Ashraf, Justin Jeffery, Mousheng Xu, Paul M. C. Park, Hasan Mukhtar, Achal K. Srivastava, Mohammed Faruq, James E. Bradner, Aseem Z. Ansari; Science 30 Nov 2017 eaan6414, Published Online 30 Nov 2017 DOI: 10.1126/science.aan6414

The molecule being tested is designed to assist the enzyme that reads, or “transcribes,” DNA at the confusing repeats. Once it reaches the other side, the enzyme, called RNA polymerase, reads the gene and makes RNA that in turn codes for frataxin, the protein that is lacking in Friedreich’s ataxia.

Synthetic transcription elongation factors license transcription across repressive chromatin