DnaG

DnaG is a bacterial DNA primase and is encoded by the dnaG gene. The enzyme DnaG, and any other DNA primase, synthesizes short strands of RNA known as oligonucleotides during DNA replication. These oligonucleotides are known as primers because they act as a starting point for DNA synthesis. DnaG catalyzes the synthesis of oligonucleotides that are 10 to 60 nucleotides (the fundamental unit of DNA and RNA) long, however most of the oligonucleotides synthesized are 11 nucleotides. These RNA oligonucleotides serve as primers, or starting points, for DNA synthesis by bacterial DNA polymerase III (Pol III). DnaG is important in bacterial DNA replication because DNA polymerase cannot initiate the synthesis of a DNA strand, but can only add nucleotides to a preexisting strand. DnaG synthesizes a single RNA primer at the origin of replication. This primer serves to prime leading strand DNA synthesis. For the other parental strand, the lagging strand, DnaG synthesizes an RNA primer every few kilobases (kb). These primers serve as substrates for the synthesis of Okazaki fragments.

In E. coli DnaG associates through noncovalent interactions with bacterial replicative helicase DnaB to perform its primase activity, with three DnaG primase proteins associating with each DnaB helicase to form the primosome. Primases tend to initiate synthesis at specific three nucleotide sequences on single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) templates and for E. coli DnaG the sequence is 5'-CTG-3'.