title: The Hammerhead Ribozyme: A Long History for a Short RNA.
abstract: Small nucleolytic ribozymes are a family of naturally occurring RNA motifs that catalyse a self-transesterification reaction in a highly sequence-specific manner. The hammerhead ribozyme was the first reported and the most extensively studied member of this family. However, and despite intense biochemical and structural research for three decades since its discovery, the history of this model ribozyme seems to be far from finished. The hammerhead ribozyme has been regarded as a biological oddity typical of small circular RNA pathogens of plants. More recently, numerous and new variations of this ribozyme have been found to inhabit the genomes of organisms from all life kingdoms, although their precise biological functions are not yet well understood.
authors.affiliation: Instituto de Biología Molecular y Celular de Plantas (IBMCP) (CSIC-UPV), C/Ingeniero Fausto Elio s/n, 46022 Valencia, Spain. rivero@ibmcp.upv.es.
authors.forename: Marcos
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: de la Peña
authors.affiliation: Department of Genetics, University of Valencia, C/Dr. Moliner 50, Burjassot, 46100 Valencia, Spain. garciai@uv.es.
authors.forename: Inmaculada
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: García-Robles
authors.affiliation: Instituto de Biología Molecular y Celular de Plantas (IBMCP) (CSIC-UPV), C/Ingeniero Fausto Elio s/n, 46022 Valencia, Spain. amcerol@ibmcp.upv.es.
authors.forename: Amelia
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Cervera
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D020029:Base Pairing; D001483:Base Sequence; D055162:Biocatalysis; D020134:Catalytic Domain; D049673:History, 20th Century; D049674:History, 21st Century; D006868:Hydrolysis; D008958:Models, Molecular; D009690:Nucleic Acid Conformation; D010944:Plants / Q000737:chemistry*; D012313:RNA / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000266:history / Q000502:physiology / Q000648:ultrastructure; D016337:RNA, Catalytic / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000266:history / Q000502:physiology / Q000648:ultrastructure; D000079962:RNA, Circular; D012550:Schistosoma mansoni / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D016337:RNA, Catalytic; D000079962:RNA, Circular; C427204:hammerhead ribozyme; D012313:RNA
keywords: RNA catalysis; phosphodiester bond; self-cleaving