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Full-Text Articles in Biochemistry, Biophysics, and Structural Biology

Inteins From Pathogenic Microbes As Regulatory Elements And Potential Drug Targets, Cathleen Maria Schiraldi Jan 2019

Inteins From Pathogenic Microbes As Regulatory Elements And Potential Drug Targets, Cathleen Maria Schiraldi

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Inteins are self-splicing elements that orchestrate the autocatalytic process of protein splicing, during which the intein excises itself from a host polypeptide. This multistep reaction involves a series of coordinated nucleophilic attacks and peptide bond rearrangements that remove the intein and reassemble the flanking halves, called exteins, to form the mature host protein. Some inteins are also mobile elements, and can spread to the same or ectopic sites using an internal homing endonuclease domain.


The Dissemination, Regulatory Role, And Evolution Of Mycobacterial Inteins, Danielle Skye Kelley Jan 2018

The Dissemination, Regulatory Role, And Evolution Of Mycobacterial Inteins, Danielle Skye Kelley

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Inteins are intervening protein elements, capable of coordinating escape from a host protein through a self-catalyzed mechanism, called protein splicing. This results in free intein and a mature host protein product. Inteins are also mobile elements and many contain homing endonucleases that enable the targeting to ectopic sites and invasion of novel niches. Inteins have been found across all three domains of life and are often present in replication, recombination, and repair proteins. However, it is unclear if the observed distribution is simply a factor of endonuclease preference or if inteins have been selectively maintained due to an adaptation that …


The Structural Heterogeneity And Dynamics Of Base Stacking And Unstacking In Nucleic Acids, Ada Anna Sedova Jan 2015

The Structural Heterogeneity And Dynamics Of Base Stacking And Unstacking In Nucleic Acids, Ada Anna Sedova

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Base stacking provides stability to nucleic acid duplexes, and base unstacking is involved in numerous biological functions related to nucleic acids, including replication, repair, transcription, and translation. The patterns of base stacking and unstacking in available nucleic acid crystal structures were classified after separation into their individual single strand dinucleotide components and clustering using a k-means-based ensemble clustering method. The A- and B-form proximity of these dinucleotide structures were assessed to discover that RNA dinucleotides can approach B-form-like structures. Umbrella sampling molecular dynamics simulations were used to obtain the potential of mean force profiles for base unstacking at 5'-termini for …


Molecular Evolution Of Genes Underlying Phenotypic Differences Between Humans And Chimpanzees, Santhoshi Bandla Jan 2009

Molecular Evolution Of Genes Underlying Phenotypic Differences Between Humans And Chimpanzees, Santhoshi Bandla

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and bonobos (P. paniscus) are often used as models to study the genetic and morphological changes on the lineage leading to the modern humans (Homo sapiens). Results of this dissertation suggest that, in comparison to other hominoids, chimpanzees and bonobos are more derived in their relative testes sizes and promiscuous mating systems. Phylogenetic analysis of genes that might underlie increased testes size revealed that, in addition to being a sex-determining gene, SRY displays Pan-specific amino acid replacements that make it a compelling candidate as a testes-size determining gene. Strikingly, SRY and another candidate gene, DMRT3, display patterns …


A Locus-Based Paradigm For Generating Systems Biological Inferences From Large Scale Functional Genomics Datasets, Ajish Dominic George Jan 2009

A Locus-Based Paradigm For Generating Systems Biological Inferences From Large Scale Functional Genomics Datasets, Ajish Dominic George

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Genomics data is growing at a exponential rate. The ability to integrate new results with existing knowledge about genomic biology is rapidly becoming the limiting factor as there no universal language with which to describe genomic functional elements. To integrate and compare new and existing genomic data, we define our basic functional unit of a genome to be a locus -- a set of positional coordinates along any genome with an arbitrary amount of functional annotations attached. The locus concept enables addressing genomic elements and annotations at any level of granularity from entire swaths of chromosomes to single base-positions. We …