| Library / English Dictionary |
NUCLEASE
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
General term for enzymes that catalyze the hydrolysis of nucleic acid by cleaving chains of nucleotides into smaller units
Classified under:
Hypernyms ("nuclease" is a kind of...):
enzyme (any of several complex proteins that are produced by cells and act as catalysts in specific biochemical reactions)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "nuclease"):
endonuclease (a nuclease that cleaves nucleic acids at interior bonds and so produces fragments of various sizes)
exonuclease (a nuclease that releases one nucleotide at a time (serially) beginning at one of a nucleic acid)
Context examples:
Deoxyribonucleases belong to a larger family of nucleases, which cleave DNA bases at various positions in the DNA backbone.
(Deoxyribonuclease, NCI Thesaurus)
Non-homologous DNA end joining (NHEJ) can only repair double-strand breaks in which two DNA ends are rejoined by DNA ligase at regions of little or no homology to avoid degradation by DNA nucleases or noncomplementary overhanging ends.
(Nonhomologous DNA End Joining, NCI Thesaurus)
One nuclease involved in apoptosis is DNA fragmentation factor (DFF), a caspase-activated DNAse (CAD).
(Apoptotic DNA Fragmentation Pathway, NCI Thesaurus/BIOCARTA)
