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Smaller TextCanada Research Chair in Directed Evolution of Nucleic Acids
Yingfu Li
Assistant Professor, Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences
Email: liying@mcmaster.ca
Web:
Research Involves
The catalytic abilities of enzymes made of DNA and RNA.
Research Relevance
Understanding molecular evolution and the origin of life; possible manipulation of DNA enzymes for gene repair or targeted cell destruction.
Twin Catalysts: DNA and RNA
Yingfu Li is not only exploring the origins of life. In his Hamilton, Ontario laboratory, he’s recreating it.
The McMaster University scientist is studying DNA and RNA enzymes, first by creating them in his laboratory and then by trying to understand their functions. Although nucleic acid catalysts have only limited functions in biochemical catalysis in existing life forms, scientists believe they played essential roles in very early forms of life on earth. Most of these ancestral nucleic acid enzymes may have disappeared during the long history of the evolution of life on earth. Therefore, scientists, including Li’s team at McMaster University, rely on evolutionary techniques to create DNA and RNA enzymes from scratch in order to then study them in depth.
Researchers are still trying to understand if DNA and RNA could perform efficient catalysis and if we could develop DNA and RNA enzymes into practical tools with biomedical applications. Can researchers invent numerous DNA enzymes and then use them to control biological processes? Did catalytic DNA have anything to do with the origin of life on Earth?
These questions lie at the heart of Li’s research. They are also at the centre of lines of inquiry scientists have been pursuing for generations. By experimenting with RNA and DNA enzymes, Li hopes to discover whether these enzymes can be used to destroy cancer cells or be engineered into tools that will insert RNA into cells to repair genes.
Awarding Li this Canada Research Chair will support the career of this promising young scientist, allowing him to work toward further discoveries and build upon his record as one of the first scientists to specialize in studying DNA enzymes.
Already, scientists have used synthetic or natural drugs that target nucleic acids as anti-tumour agents. Learning more about DNA and RNA enzymes may enable scientists to create new chemotherapeutic agents for the treatment of cancer as well as of viral and parasitic diseases.
