Primer- and template-independent RNA polymerization by terminal nucleotidyltransferase TENT4B
Neha Nagpal, Albert K Tai, Yick W Fong, Suneet Agarwal · 2026
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Description
Neha Nagpal and co-authors report a surprising enzyme finding in this 2026 paper. Textbook rules say RNA is built only by copying a template or extending a primer. The team studied a human enzyme called TENT4B, which normally adds letters to the ends of RNA strands, and found it can start RNA chains from scratch.
In test tubes the enzyme burned through free building blocks and produced RNA chains made mostly of one letter, with no primer or template present. The chains could grow to thousands of letters long. A second letter type gave short, stubborn chains instead. Other RNA-building enzymes showed the same trick only weakly and at far higher doses. The authors call the result firm proof of template-free RNA building by a eukaryote enzyme.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Neha Nagpal, Albert K Tai, Yick W Fong, Suneet Agarwal |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2026 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 48 KB |
| VERSION | 1.0 |
| LICENSE | CC BY 4.0 |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | Europe PMC |