[Artificial ribonucleases: quantitative analysis of the structure-activity relationship and new insight into the strategy of design of highly efficient RNase mimetics]

Multicomponent synthesis of artificial nucleases and their RNase and DNase activity

The synthesis of new, artificial ribonucleases containing two amino acid residues connected by an aliphatic linker has been developed. Target molecules were synthesized via a catalytic three-component Ugi reaction from aliphatic diisocyanides. Preliminary investigations proved unspecific nuclease activity of the new compounds towards single-stranded RNA and double-stranded circular DNA.

Inactivation of the tick-borne encephalitis virus by RNA-cleaving compounds

The tick-borne encephalitis virus (TBEV) is an RNA-containing enveloped virus, which poses a major threat to the well-being and health of humans. In this study, we describe an approach to the inactivation of TBEV, which involves the degradation of viral RNA by artificial ribonucleases (aRNases, small organic compounds that exhibit ribonuclease activity in vitro). We demonstrate that the incubation of TBEV with aRNases lead to the total inactivation of the virus as indicated by the plaque formation assay data, but retain the viral immunogenic properties, as shown by the ELISA data. We propose that a possible mechanism of TBEV inactivation with aRNase, which includes: i) formation of local breaks in the lipid membrane of the virus caused by aRNase, ii) penetration of aRNase into the viral capsid, iii) degradation of genomic RNA by aRNase. These data suggest that the proposed approach can be used in the production of killed-virus vaccine.