Review on Inteins: Structures, Function, Mechanisms and Their Application in Biotechnology

Background and aim: Inteins are genetic elements that actions resemble introns with this difference that inteins not only are transcribed but also are translated. These elements at the protein level are isolated from the host protein and joined their flanking regions with a peptide bond. The aim of this review at the first is a brief introduction to biotechnology and its applications then an understanding of genetic elements as inteins and their application in biotechnology.\ud \ud Methods: In this study, the related articles for this subject were collected from international databases such as ISI, PubMed and Scopus and also Persian articles through Iranmedex database.\ud \ud Results: At the first time, Inteins were identified in Saccharomyces cerevisiae in 1990. Protein splicing, an intramolecular process, was performed by Inteins without any cofactors and metabolic energy sources. Inteins have different applications in biotechnology such as\ud Self-circularization for synthesis of large genetics library and rapid purifications of proteins.\ud \ud Conclusion: Inteins due to the ability to cleave from proteins and ligate the up and down segment, natural or engineered, have different applications in many technologies such as enzymology, protein engineering, target detection, microarray production and purification of recombinant proteins.\u