Molecular crowding varies spatio-temporally in cells, affecting the stability of nucleic acids and inducing their non-canonical structures. However, the exact behavior of nucleic acids in local cellular environments remains unclear. Here, the authors report guanine-quadruplex (G4) DNA formation in the environment specific to human mitochondria and demonstrate repression of gene expression by G4 formation in mitochondria.
- Lutan Liu
- Shuntaro Takahashi
- Naoki Sugimoto
