RNA Polymerase (shown in blue) moves across a template strand of DNA (shown in purple) and transcribes it into RNA (shown in red). But DNA damage blocks the RNA polymerase, causing it to stall and ...

Researchers have uncovered a previously hidden layer of complexity in how genes are activated, showing that water molecules ...

How does the cell convert DNA into working proteins? The process of translation can be seen as the decoding of instructions for making proteins, involving mRNA in transcription as well as tRNA. But ...

EM, researchers showed that water mediates catalysis and important protein interactions for RNA polymerase II function in ...

A cell protein previously believed only to provide a scaffolding for DNA has also been shown to directly influence DNA transcription into RNA – the first step of the process by which an organism's ...

Gene syntax alters DNA supercoiling to amplify or suppress nearby genes. This could improve the effectiveness of gene ...

Researchers have discovered that in thale cresses histone H3 lysine-9 (H3K9) methylation, conventionally thought to be a mark of turning off gene transcription, can also turn on gene expression via ...

Every living cell must interpret its genetic code - a sequence of chemical letters that governs countless cellular functions. A new study by researchers from the Center for Theoretical Biological ...

'Random DNA' is naturally active in the one-celled fungi yeast, while such DNA is turned off as its natural state in mammalian cells, despite their having a common ancestor a billion years ago and the ...

RNA polymerase, the enzyme that synthesizes RNA from DNA during transcription, has been captured mid-reaction for the first ...

When the molecular machinery in our cells gets to work transcribing the genetic information encoded in DNA into messenger RNA (mRNA), it pauses shortly after starting. Known as promoter-proximal ...