Artemis is a 78 kDa protein, belonging to metallo-beta-lactamase superfamily. It is involved in endonuclease activity to break DNA hairpins. It also has been reported that the C-terminus of Artemis interacts with DNA binding domain of Ligase IV directly. Ligase IV is a key enzyme in DNA repair and V(D)J recombination. Thus, Artemis is a novel protein that is involved in V(D)J recombination/DNA repair. Mutations cause human T-B-severe combined immunodeficiency associated with increased cellular radiosensitivity (RS-SCID).
