화학공학소재연구정보센터
Macromolecules, Vol.49, No.11, 4277-4285, 2016
Elucidating the DNA-Histone Interaction in Nucleosome from the DNA-Dendrimer Complex
The electrostatic complex of DNA with poly(amidoamine) G6 dendrimer (called "dendriplex") is used' as a model system to resolve if pure electrostatic interaction can lead to the key structural features of nucleosome. Both dendrimer and histone octamer (HO) are found to attract DNA to wrap helically around them with comparable pitch lengths; however, the superhelical trajectory in the dendriplex is loose and fluctuating, whereas that in nucleosome is tight and rigid. The DNA-wrapped dendtimer particles are closely spaced along the dendriplex fiber, while the nucleosome core particles (NCPs) in the nucleosome array are separated by relatively king linker DNA. The clear contrast in structural features attests that DNA HO interaction is beyond electrostatics, as additional specific interactions exist to fix DNA superhelical trajectory and to select the favored DNA sequence for constituting the NCP.