Current Projects:

Projects in the lab are focused on understanding the enzyme mechanism and biological function of tRNA processing enzymes, including a unique 3'-5' polymerase that catalyzes diverse tRNA maintenance and repair reactions and an m1G9 methyltransferase with unexpected substrate specificity and multiple roles in higher eukaryotes, including humans.  We use enzyme kinetics, structural, and genetic approaches to answer these questions.

Five Recent Publications:

Smith BA, Jackman JE. Kinetic Analysis of 3'-5' Nucleotide Addition Catalyzed by Eukaryotic tRNA(His) Guanylyltransferase. Biochemistry. 2012 Jan 10;51(1):453-65. Epub 2011 Dec 14. PubMed PMID: 22136300; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC3254824.

Abad MG, Long Y, Willcox A, Gott JM, Gray MW, Jackman JE. A role for tRNA(His) guanylyltransferase (Thg1)-like proteins from Dictyostelium discoideum in mitochondrial 5'-tRNA editing. RNA. 2011 Apr;17(4):613-23. Epub 2011 Feb 9. PubMed PMID: 21307182; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC3062173.
 
Hyde SJ, Eckenroth BE, Smith BA, Eberley WA, Heintz NH, Jackman JE, Doublié S. tRNA(His) guanylyltransferase (THG1), a unique 3'-5' nucleotidyl transferase, shares unexpected structural homology with canonical 5'-3' DNA polymerases. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2010 Nov 23;107(47):20305-10. Epub 2010 Nov 8. PubMed PMID: 21059936; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC2996709.
 
Rao BS, Maris EL, Jackman JE. tRNA 5'-end repair activities of tRNAHis guanylyltransferase (Thg1)-like proteins from Bacteria and Archaea. Nucleic Acids Res. 2011 Mar;39(5):1833-42. Epub 2010 Nov 3. PubMed PMID: 21051361; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC3061083.
 
Abad MG, Rao BS, Jackman JE. Template-dependent 3'-5' nucleotide addition is a shared feature of tRNAHis guanylyltransferase enzymes from multiple domains of life. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2010 Jan 12;107(2):674-9. Epub 2009 Dec 18. PubMed PMID: 20080734; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC2818966.

Publication at PubMed