I did a mini-project on the drug azacitidine for my pharmacology class, and I learned that azacitidine has the ability to incorporate into both DNA and RNA. I think this is really unique because a similar drug, decitabine, is exclusively incorporated into DNA. Are there any specific physical/structural characteristics of azacitidine that allow it to affect the structure and function of DNA/RNA? Any help would be greatly appreciated!
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If you look at the very beginning of the Wikipedia page, you'll see that azacitidine is an analog of cytidine, the C letter of both DNA and RNA fame. Decitabine is a deoxy derivative, and hence would only be incorporated into deoxyribonucleic acid, or DNA.
Reading further, by structure azacitidine is ribonucleoside derivative, and is preferentially incorporated into RNA. However, it can be metabolized to 5-aza-2′-deoxycytidine-triphosphate and so be incorporated into DNA.
