A Highly Thermostable Heme–G‐Quadruplex DNAzyme: Structural Integrity and Catalytic Function Under Elevated‐Temperature Aqueous Conditions
Heme-G-quadruplex DNAzymes are promising biomolecular catalysts; however, their structural stability and catalytic function under elevated-temperature aqueous conditions remain poorly understood. We systematically demonstrate that rationally increasing the number of consecutively stacked G-quartets in the DNA scaffold provides a useful strategy for constructing a highly thermostable heme-G-quadruplex DNAzyme. Our results establish a clear relationship between G-quartet stacking and enhanced thermal robustness of heme-G-quadruplex DNAzymes. The engineered DNAzyme retained its peroxidase activity at temperatures up to 90 °C, far exceeding the thermal stability of conventional protein-based peroxidases, which typically denature under such conditions. These results demonstrate the potential of G-quadruplex engineering for designing robust biocatalysts and establish a general strategy for engineering thermostable DNAzymes.
Authors
- Ryo Karita
- China Okamoto (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0004-6870-663X)
- Yasuhiko Yamamoto (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4951-3184)
- Atsuya Momotake (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1040-0468)
- Yuri Shokaku
- Daiki Fukasawa
Institutions
- University of Tsukuba (JP)
- Tsukuba University of Technology (JP)
- National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (JP)
Publication Details
- Journal
- ChemBioChem
- Published
- 2026-07-24
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1002/cbic.70482
- Primary Topic
- Advanced biosensing and bioanalysis techniques
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00
Funders
- National Key Research and Development Program of China