Laboratory "Lésions des Acides Nucléiques"

Jean Cadet

Département de Recherche Fondamentale sur la Matière Condensée, SCIB/LAN, CEA/Grenoble, France

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Research interests

Dr. Jean Cadet, the responsible scientist, is scientific advisor at Laboratory "Lésions des Acides Nucléiques" or "DNA Lesions" at the Département de Recherche Fondamentale sur la Matière Condensée, SCIB/LAN, CEA/Grenoble, France. The Group includes 8 Research Associates (chemists and biochemists, 3 postdoctoral fellow 6 PhD Students, and 4 Laboratory Assistants. One of the major aims of the laboratory is the determination of the mechanisms of the reactions leading to the formation of DNA damage induced by exposure to ionising radiation (gamma rays, heavy ions), solar light and in a more general way to various oxidising agents (hydroxyl radical, singlet oxygen, hydrogen peroxide, peroxinitrite). In that respect information is available on the .OH radical- and one-electron oxidation-mediated formation pathways of single and tandem modifications from the main DNA nucleosides. A second major objective of the research group is to gain insights into the mechanisms of radiation-induced formation of modifications to DNA within cells. For this purpose we have developed various sensitive and accurate chemical and biochemical methods aimed at measuring targeted lesions within both isolated and cellular DNA at a level as low as a few modifications per 107 normal bases... It should be added that major efforts are devoted to the synthesis of site-specific modified oligonucleotides that are used for the determination of biological end-points such as DNA repair enzyme specificity, mutagenesis through DNA replication studies and translesional synthesis. Another possibility offered by the synthesis of modified oligonucleotides is the specific generation of a dedicated base radical within DNA fragments from a suitable inserted precursor after mild photochemical excitation.

COST P9 Workings group(s) of interest: WG