Recombinases are
genetic recombination enzymes. DNA recombinases are widely used in multicellular organisms to manipulate the structure of
genomes, and to control
gene expression. These enzymes, derived from
bacteria and
fungi, catalyze directionally sensitive DNA exchange reactions between short (30–40
nucleotides) target site sequences that are specific to each recombinase. These reactions enable four basic functional modules, excision/insertion, inversion, translocation and
cassette exchange, which have been used individually or combined in a wide range of configurations to control gene expression.