Achieving single-nucleotide resolution of 5-methylcytosine detection with TALEs

Abstract

We report engineered transcription-activator-like effectors (TALEs) as the first DNA-binding molecules that detect 5-methylcytosine (mC) at single-nucleotide resolution with fully programmable sequence selectivity. This is achieved by a design strategy such that a single cytosine (C) in a DNA sequence is selectively interrogated for its mC-modification level by targeting with a discriminatory TALE repeat; other Cs are ignored by targeting with universal-binding TALE repeats.

Keywords: DNA methylation; TALE proteins; epigenetics; programmable protein scaffolds; sensors.