Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Niu, Tian Hui

Titel

Structural and functional insights into the fat mass and obesity-associated (fto) gene

Ort / Verlag

ProQuest Dissertations & Theses

Erscheinungsjahr

2011

Quelle

ProQuest Dissertations & Theses A&I

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Translation from original language as provided by authorRecent studies have unequivocally associated the fat mass and obesity-associated (FTO) gene with the risk of obesity. In 2007, two groups independently found that a common variant (rs9939609) in the FTO gene is associated with Body Mass Index (BMI) and people carrying the variant are more susceptible to obesity. Besides in vertebrates, FTO homologs exist in green algae Ostreococcus and Diatoms but not in insects, worms or fungi. In human, FTO is located on chromosome 16 and in mouse on chromosome 8, both of which contain 9 exons while rs9939609 lies in the first intron. FTO protein was predicted and biochemically confirmed to belong to the AlkB family of Fe(II)/2-oxoglutarate-dependent oxidative DNA/RNA demethylases. It differs from other members in that FTO has a distinct nucleotide specificity, with a strong preference for 3-meT and 3-meU in ssDNA and ssRNA respectively. In addition, FTO contains an extended C-terminus that has no sequence similarity t