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If not, is it impossible for DNA to have enzymatic activity?

The Obscure Question
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1 Answers1

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Not very common, and not found so far in nature, but they exist and are called deoxyribozymes.

Additional information:

Deoxyribozymes are the equivalent of ribozymes in the DNA world and can function as catalysts for different biochemical reactions, such as DNA cleavage. While DNAzymes (short name) were synthesized in a laboratory context (In-vitro) and proved to be active, no observations were made of DNA molecules having an enzymatic activity In-vivo which is of course not a definitive proof they don't exist in nature.

The latter point is a major difference compared to ribozymes which were proved to be active and functional in living cells.

cagliari2005
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  • How did I miss the analogous name? :P – The Obscure Question Mar 12 '15 at 02:15
  • @TheObscureQuestion Thought the same when I saw you question :D. By the way excellent question, I actually knew about them because I looked that up recently while asking myself the exact same question. – cagliari2005 Mar 12 '15 at 03:09
  • Can you at least give a short summary of the Wikipedia article? Dropping a link (and this is more or less it) is usually not appreciated. – Karolas Mar 12 '15 at 09:09
  • @Karolas I thought about doing that but they are just exactly the same as ribozymes but DNA-based instead of RNA-based. Anyway you are right I will add some more information. – cagliari2005 Mar 12 '15 at 09:12