A discovery published in the acclaimed journal Nature reports an amazing breakthrough — being able to study naturally occurring DNA-protein hybrids. The serendipitous discovery of this striking feature could indeed pave the way for the design of precision pharmacies and completely transform our approach in treating diseases.
Marrying DNA and Proteins
For the better part of the past century, chemists have sought to do something similar with two of biology’s most prevalent building blocks: nucleic acids (which cells use to create copies of their DNA and RNA) and amino acids (the compounds that form proteins). Unfortunately, this task has proven to be an array due to the completely opposed nature of these two groups of macromolecules both in terms of structure and function.
Fortunately, an exciting new landscape was unveiled from a recent discovery of naturally occurring DNA-protein hybrids. Using the molecule-building capabilities of bacteria that already exist, scientists have found a way to produce massive collections of potential molecules called DNA-protein hybrid molecules much more quickly than before.
Realizing the Promise of Biohybrid Molecules
These DNA-Protein-hybrids even could hold the potential for groundbreaking action. By adding a DNA tag to one of these reprogrammable protein-generating systems – like, as others have done but in different ways, by employing recombinase enzymes or Cre/Lox from bacteriophages — you could create drugs that only go after particular locations within the genome with cancer-causing mutations. On the other hand, this mechanism could possibly block the transcription of mutant genes or bind to disease-causing noncoding RNA molecules and interfere with their function.
Before this new process was developed, generating any of these biohybrids was time-consuming and involved labor-intensive use of a number of synthetic chemical approaches. However, the natural process that has been discovered will allow laboratories to use bacteria instead of radicals as a catalyst to improve the pipeline and find these potentially medicinal compounds faster.
Conclusion
The fact that these DNA-protein hybrids were present in nature has very significant implications for the field of biomedical research. Using bacteria as factories, scientists can produce large quantities of biohybrid molecules that may be designed to bind at any desired region of the genome or RNA, thereby potentially enabling a radical shift in how precision drugs are engineered and diseases are healed.
