Protein Nucleic Acid Interactions

Catalog description

This course presents an overview of protein-nucleic acid interactions. Topics discussed in the first part of the course include elements of DNA and RNA structure (DNA bending, duplex, triplex, quadruplex, I-motif and RNA structural motifs). The second part of the course covers known structural domains found in DNA and/or RNA binding proteins, followed by discussions of various protein-nucleic acid complexes and their biological functions. Besides introducing the topic of protein-nucleic acid interactions, the course aims at encouraging the students to critically think about and discuss recent papers in the literature as well as to develop and improve oral presentation skills. Students taking this course should have at minimum successfully completed two semesters of Biochemistry.