Can pseudocomplementary peptide nucleic acid nucleases (pcPNANs) be a new tool for genetic engineering?
Author and article information
Abstract
Zinc-finger nucleases (ZFNs) and transcription activator-like effector nucleases (TALENs) comprise a powerful class of tools that are redefining the boundaries of biological research. Although these technologies have begun to enable targeted genome modifications, there remains a need for new technologies that are scalable, affordable, and easy to engineer. In this paper, we propose a new tool for genetic engineering, the pseudocomplementary peptide nucleic acid nucleases (pcPNANs), which are composed of a pseudocomplementary PNA (pcPNA) specific for a DNA target sequence, a FokI nuclease cleavage domain and a nuclear localization signal. pcPNANs may induce targeted DNA double-strand breaks that activate DNA damage response pathways and enable custom alterations. Their cleavage-site is determined by simple Watson-Crick rule, and thus pcPNANs for aimed cleavage of genomes can be straightforwardly designed and synthesized without any selection procedure. Accordingly, the cleavage-site and site-specificity are freely chosen by changing the sequences and the lengths of pcPNA strands. We believe that the potentiality of pcPNAN as a new tool for genetic engineering will be confirmed in the future.
Cite this as
2014. Can pseudocomplementary peptide nucleic acid nucleases (pcPNANs) be a new tool for genetic engineering? PeerJ PrePrints 2:e229v1 https://doi.org/10.7287/peerj.preprints.229v1Sections
Additional Information
Competing Interests
No competing interests were disclosed.
Author Contributions
Penghui Shi conceived and designed the experiments, performed the experiments, analyzed the data, contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools, wrote the paper, prepared figures and/or tables, reviewed drafts of the paper.
Funding
The author(s) declared that no grants were involved in supporting this work. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
