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Phylogenomic Identification Of Five New Human Homologs Of The Dna Repair Enzyme Alkb, Michal A. Kurowski, Ashok S. Bhagwat, Grzegorz Papaj, Janusz M. Bujnicki

Wayne State University Associated BioMed Central Scholarship

Abstract

Background

Combination of biochemical and bioinformatic analyses led to the discovery of oxidative demethylation – a novel DNA repair mechanism catalyzed by the Escherichia coli AlkB protein and its two human homologs, hABH2 and hABH3. This discovery was based on the prediction made by Aravind and Koonin that AlkB is a member of the 2OG-Fe²⁺ oxygenase superfamily.

Results

In this article, we report identification and sequence analysis of five human members of the (2OG-Fe²⁺) oxygenase superfamily designated here as hABH4 through hABH8. These experimentally uncharacterized and poorly annotated genes were not associated with the AlkB family …