Transferase

A transferase is an enzyme which can transfer a functional group from one molecule to another.

Like all enzymes, transferases are proteins which have an active site for the enzyme reaction and a target molecule recognition site which gives the reaction its specificity.

There are many types of transferases (methyltransferases, glycosyltransferases, phosphotransferases…) depending on the type of group which they transfer. In order to distinguish them, the transferases have a name which is given to them by the donor, acceptor and transferred groups (or only par by some of these names). A DNA methyltransferase is therefore a transferase which catalyses the transfer of a methyl group to DNA.