WARS2

Tryptophanyl-tRNA synthetase, mitochondrial is an enzyme that in humans is encoded by the WARS2 gene.

Function
Aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases catalyze the aminoacylation of tRNA by their cognate amino acid. Because of their central role in linking amino acids with nucleotide triplets contained in tRNAs, aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases are thought to be among the first proteins that appeared in evolution. Two forms of tryptophanyl-tRNA synthetase exist, a cytoplasmic form, named WARS, and a mitochondrial form, named WARS2. This gene encodes the mitochondrial tryptophanyl-tRNA synthetase. Two alternative transcripts encoding different isoforms have been described. According to recent research, mutations of the mitochondrial form of the enzyme are believed to express two different neurological disorders: A subtype of autosomal recessive intellectual disability and a syndrome of severe infantile‐onset leukoencephalopathy.