Taq polymerase

Common card · No. 379611

Taq polymerase is a thermostable DNA polymerase named after the thermophilic bacterium Thermus aquaticus, from which it was originally isolated by master's student Alice Chien et al. in 1976. Its name is often abbreviated to Taq or Taq pol. It is frequently used in the polymerase chain reaction (PCR), a method for greatly amplifying the quantity of short segments of DNA. It possesses a 5' → 3' polymerase activity and a 5' flap endonuclease activity. It has a theoretical molecular weight of 94 kDa. T. aquaticus is a bacterium that lives in hot springs and hydrothermal vents, and Taq polymerase was identified as an enzyme able to withstand the protein-denaturing conditions (high temperature) required during PCR. Therefore, it replaced the DNA polymerase from E. coli originally used in PCR.

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