Differential repair of etheno-DNA adducts by bacterial and human AlkB proteins

- BER enzymes based assay was developed to measure ɛ-adducts repair by AlkBs.
- Many bacterial AlkBs can repair ɛ-adducts.
- Xanthomonas campestris and Rhizobium etli encode AlkB proteins specialized for ɛ-adducts repair.
- Human AlkBH2 and three of nine bacterial AlkBs repair 1,N2-ɛG.
- Nucleotide recognition lid is not the sole determinant of AlkBs substrate specificity.