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Fine structure of DNA melting curves
Author(s) -
Lyubchenko Yu. L.,
Frank–Kamenetskii M. D.,
Volgodskii A. V.,
Lazurkin Yu. S.,
Gause G. G.
Publication year - 1976
Publication title -
biopolymers
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.556
H-Index - 125
eISSN - 1097-0282
pISSN - 0006-3525
DOI - 10.1002/bip.1976.360150602
Subject(s) - polynucleotide , dna , base pair , melting curve analysis , chemistry , base (topology) , melting temperature , covalent bond , crystallography , differential (mechanical device) , thermodynamics , physics , mathematics , materials science , mathematical analysis , biochemistry , polymerase chain reaction , organic chemistry , composite material , gene
Theoretical calculations predict that the differential melting curves for random polynucleotide sequences having lengths up to several tens of thousands of base pairs have a clear‐cut fine structure. This structure appears in the form of multiple narrow peaks 0.3–0.4°C wide on the bell shaped main curve. The differential melting curves have different shapes for different specific sequences. The theory also predicts the disappearance of the fine structure when the length of the sequence increases and when circular, covalently closed DNA is considered instead of the open structure. The predictions of the theory were confirmed by the measurements of differential melting curves for open and covalently closed circular forms of DNA for PM2 phage ( N = 10 4 base pairs) and also for other phage DNA's of different length: T7 ( N = 3.8 × 10 4 ); S D ( N = 9.2 × 10 4 ); T2 ( N = 17 × 10 4 ). It was shown that the effect of fine structure results mainly from the cooperative melting out of DNA regions 300–500 base pairs long.