DESIGN OF HAMMERHEAD RIBOZYMES TO DISTINGUISH SINGLE-BASE CHANGES IN SUBSTRATE RNA

Hammerhead ribozymes are attractive tools in antisense gene inactivati on because of their catalytic cleavage of target molecules, High seque nce discrimination should be possible, since the cleavage efficiencies were already significantly reduced, if single base changes in substra te RNA introduce mismatches next to the cleavage site, This was observ ed at the first innermost base pair in helix I and the two innermost b ase pairs in helix III. In addition to its position, the nature of the mismatch pair was important.