Abstract
Splicing of group II introns is essential for the metabolism of many organisms (Michel et al. 1989; Michel and Ferat 1995). These ubiquitous introns play a critical role in the processing of mitochondrial genes from plants, fungi, and yeast. Group II introns and RNA molecules resembling them are abundant in euglena and other lower eukaryotes, and they have even been identified in prokaryotes. It has been proposed that, through reactions analogous to the reverse of splicing, excised introns can migrate and introduce themselves into new genomes that may not even ordinarily contain introns (Lambowitz and Belfort 1993; Schmidt et al. 1994). Thus, in addition to their function in RNA splicing, group II introns have the capability for involvement in other biochemical transformations. The apparent complexity of their structure and active-site chemistry has fueled interest in the mechanism of group II intron catalysis. This chapter attempts to describe recent work on group II intron chemistry and its foundation in structural features of the folded RNA.
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Pyle, A.M. (1996). Catalytic Reaction Mechanisms and Structural Features of Group II Intron Ribozymes. In: Eckstein, F., Lilley, D.M.J. (eds) Catalytic RNA. Nucleic Acids and Molecular Biology, vol 10. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-61202-2_5
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