
@article {83646,
	title = {Discovery of iron-sensing bacterial riboswitches.},
	journal = {Nat Chem Biol},
	year = {2020},
	month = {2020 Oct 05},
	abstract = {<p>Despite the central role of iron in biology, our understanding of how cells sense iron is limited to protein-dependent mechanisms. Here, we report the discovery of iron-sensing riboswitches (named Sensei). Present across bacterial phyla, these RNAs reside in the 5{\textquoteright} untranslated regions or within coding regions of messenger RNAs (mRNAs) encoding iron-related proteins. These riboswitches bind the reduced form of iron with high specificity. Iron binding causes conformational changes in the riboswitch that alter the accessibility of conserved nucleotides, ultimately enabling a genetic response. Sensei-iron interactions result in increased translation of the riboswitch-associated mRNA in vivo, thus positioning these riboswitches as true metalloregulators. Learning from natural Sensei RNAs, we engineer metal selectivity, successfully converting a nickel/cobalt sensing riboswitch to exclusively bind iron and a Sensei RNA to now exclusively recognize cobalt. We thus define the sequence and structural space of iron-sensing RNAs and open avenues for the design of RNA-based biosensors.</p>
},
	issn = {1552-4469},
	doi = {10.1038/s41589-020-00665-7},
	author = {Bandyopadhyay, Siladitya and Chaudhury, Susmitnarayan and Mehta, Dolly and Ramesh, Arati}
}
