The growth in the number of publications on RNA and DNA editing since 2002 and the biological and disease processes are now known to be dependent and regulated by editing mechanisms is evidence of the importance editing of RNA and DNA has taken on. This research has vastly broadened the applications of RNA and DNA editing.
This book represents the cutting edge of the field. Each chapter author covers background material, latest details and discoveries, and models and goals for the field. As such, each chapter alone serves to bring the reader to the frontlines of where the action is in each area of research. In whole, the book serves as a practical guide for professionals working in, or entering, the field to understand the interrelationship of the various RNA and DNA editing areas of research to other chemical and biological processes.
Preface. Acknowledgements. Contributors. Part I: Diversification of the Proteome through RNA and DNA Editing. Chapter 1. Diversifying Exon Code Through A-To-I RNA Editing. Chapter 2. Antibody Gene Diversification by Aid-Catalyzed DNA Editing. Chapter 3. Protein-Protein and RNA-Protein Interactions in U-Insertion/Deletion RNA Editing Complexes. Chapter 4. Machinery of RNA editing in Plant Organelles. Part II: Functional Coordination of RNA Editing With Other Cellular Mechanisms. Chapter 5. Transfer RNA Editing Enzymes: At the Crossroads of Affinity and Specificity. Chapter 6. A-To-I Editing as a Co-Transcriptional RNA Processing Event. Chapter 7. Studying and Working with Ribonucleoproteins that Catalyze H/ACA Guided RNA Modification. Chapter 8. Functional Roles of Spliceosomal SNRNA Modifications in Pre-mRNA Splicing. Chapter 9. A Role for A-To-I Editing in Gene Silencing. Chapter 10. biological Implications and Broader-Range Functions For Apobec-1 and Apobec-1 Complementation Factors (ACF) Chapter 11. Antiviral Function of APOEC3 Cytidine Deaminases. Part III: Predictive Structures. Chapter 12. A-To-I Editing of ALU Repeats. Chapter 13. RNA Editing in Dinoflagellates and Implications for the Evolutionary History of the Editing Machinery. Part IV: Structural Approaches. Chapter 14. The Box C/D RNPs: Evolutionarily Ancient Nucleotide Modification Complexes. Chapter 15. Structural Features of the Adar Family of Enzymes and Their Substrates. Chapter 16. Chemistry, Phylogeny, and three-Dimensional Structure of the Apobec Protein Family. Index.
Harold C. Smith, PhD, is Professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics at the University of Rochester and the founder and Chief Scientific Officerof OyaGen, a biotech company that develops drugs that target editing enzymes. Dr. Smith organized the first Gordon Research Conference on RNA Editing in 1997 and holds four patents.
This volume is a very good compilation of the state of the art in RNA and DNA editing, and will be useful and fascinating reading for both researchers in the field and anyone with an interest in joining it. (The Quarterly Review of Biology, June 2009)