Pif1 Family Helicases

Pif1 Family Helicases

Pif1 helicases belong to an evolutionarily conserved enzyme family found from bacteria to humans. They have been best studied in the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, but their functions have also been investigated in the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe, trypanosomes, mice, and humans. In these organisms, the Pif1 helicases are multifunctional, usually working to ensure the integrity of both the nuclear and mitochondrial genomes via their various functions in Okazaki fragment maturation, double-strand break (DSB) repair, replication fork barrier maintenance, and maintaining G-quadruplex (G4) DNA stability.

Currently, we’re working on a variety of Pif1 projects to: 1) biochemically compare Pif1 activities across species, 2) determine the role(s) of a bacteriophage Pif1, and 3) utilize Pif1 helicases from thermophilic bacteria as novel reagents for both molecular biology and structural studies.