Characterization and Engineering of Two Novel Strand-Displacing B Family DNA Polymerases from Bacillus Phage SRT01hs...

Polymerase-coupled nanopore sequencing requires DNA polymerases with strong strand displacement activity and high processivity to sustain continuous signal generation. In this study, we characterized two novel B family DNA polymerases, SRHS and BBum, isolated from Bacillus phages SRT01hs and BeachBum, respectively. Both enzymes exhibited robust strand displacement, 3'→5' exonuclease activity, and maintained processivity under diverse reaction conditions, including across a broad temperature range (10-45 °C) and in the presence of multiple divalent metal cofactors (Mg²⁺, Mn²⁺, Fe²⁺), comparable to the well-characterized Phi29 polymerase. Through biochemical analysis of mutants designed using AlphaFold3-predicted structural models, we identified key residues (G96, M97, D486 in SRHS; S97, M98, A493 in BBum) that modulated exonuclease activity, substrate specificity and metal ion utilization. Engineered variants SRHS_F and BBum_Pro_L efficiently incorporated unnatural nucleotides in the presence of Mg²⁺-a function not observed in Phi29 and other wild-type strand-displacing B family polymerases. These combined biochemical features highlight SRHS and BBum as promising enzymatic scaffolds for nanopore-based long-read sequencing platforms.