title: Crystal structure of UvrB, a DNA helicase adapted for nucleotide excision repair.
abstract: Nucleotide excision repair (NER) is a highly conserved DNA repair mechanism. NER systems recognize the damaged DNA strand, cleave it on both sides of the lesion, remove and newly synthesize the fragment. UvrB is a central component of the bacterial NER system participating in damage recognition, strand excision and repair synthesis. We have solved the crystal structure of UvrB in the apo and the ATP-bound forms. UvrB contains two domains related in structure to helicases, and two additional domains unique to repair proteins. The structure contains all elements of an intact helicase, and is evidence that UvrB utilizes ATP hydrolysis to move along the DNA to probe for damage. The location of conserved residues and structural comparisons allow us to predict the path of the DNA and suggest that the tight pre-incision complex of UvrB and the damaged DNA is formed by insertion of a flexible beta-hairpin between the two DNA strands.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmacological Sciences, State University of New York at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, NY 11794-8651, USA.
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Theis
authors.forename: P J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Skorvaga
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Van Houten
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Kisker
mesh_terms: D000255:Adenosine Triphosphate / Q000378:metabolism; D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D001407:Bacillus / Q000201:enzymology / Q000235:genetics; D001665:Binding Sites; D018360:Crystallography, X-Ray / Q000379:methods; D004249:DNA Damage; D004265:DNA Helicases / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000378:metabolism; D004260:DNA Repair; D008958:Models, Molecular; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D017433:Protein Structure, Secondary; D016415:Sequence Alignment; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid
chemical_list: D000255:Adenosine Triphosphate; D004265:DNA Helicases