Unusual DNA Structure and DNA Damage Recognition: Structure and Dynamic Markers

Abstract

Nucleic acids play a central role in many biological processes, including information storage, gene expression, serving as messengers or structural components and even catalysis. Their diverse roles have made them targets of interest to diagnose and treat an array of human disorders such as infections, degenerative diseases and cancer. Nature has evolved proteins and ligands that recognize specific nucleic acid sequences or structures and control their function, demonstrating that this can be efficiently accomplished. This has led to the development of wide variety of synthetic molecules that selectively bind to nucleic acids. In turn, this has precipitated numerous studies which showed that nucleic acid structures and their dynamic properties must be understood in order to efficiently target specific sequences or structures.