Screening of Genetic Switches Based on the Twister Ribozyme Motif

The recent description of a new class of small endonucleolytic ribozymes termed twister opened new avenues into the development of artificial riboswitches, providing new tools for the development of artificial genetic circuits in bacteria. Here we present a method to develop new ligand-dependent riboswitches, employing the newly described catalytic motif as an expression platform in conjugation with naturally occurring or in vitro-selected aptameric domains. The twister motif is an outstandingly flexible tool for the development of highly active ribozyme-based riboswitches able to control gene expression in a ligand-dependent manner in Escherichia coli.