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Symposium: Advances in Understanding of the Biological Role of Biotin at the Clinical, Biochemical, and Molecular Level

Biotin Sensing at the Molecular Level^1–3,

Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, College of Chemical and Life Sciences, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742

Biotin influences transcription in organisms from bacteria to humans. The enzyme, biotin protein ligase, which catalyzes post-transcriptional biotin addition to biotin-dependent carboxylases, plays a central roll in transmitting the demand for biotin to gene expression. The molecular mechanism of this communication in bacteria is well understood and involves competing protein:protein interactions. Biochemical measurements indicate that this competition is kinetically controlled. In humans, the biochemistry of biotin sensing at the transcriptional level is not well characterized. However, the biotin holoenzyme ligase (holocarboxylase synthetase) is proposed to both catalyze biotin addition to carboxylases and to histones in its metabolic and transcriptional roles, respectively. Control of human holocarboxylase synthetase function is, however, considerably more complex than the simple competitive protein protein interactions observed in bacterial systems.

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: dbeckett{at}umd.edu.

Published online 3 December 2008.