ATP-dependent RNA helicase DHX29 is a DExH-box protein involved in eukaryotic translation initiation. Eukaryotic translation initiation begins with assembly of a 43S preinitiation complex which then attaches to the mRNA and starts scanning the 5'-UTR to the initiation codon. DHX29 is required to bind to the 40S subunit of the 43S preinitiation complex to allow highly structured 5'-UTRs to be scanned. DHX29 has been shown to hydrolyze ATP, GTP, UTP and CTP, and promotes 48S complex formation [, ].
