Skip to main content
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America logoLink to Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
. 1972 Oct;69(10):3054–3057. doi: 10.1073/pnas.69.10.3054

Adenovirus-2 DNA Contains an Inverted Terminal Repetition

John Wolfson 1, David Dressler 1
PMCID: PMC389705  PMID: 4507622

Abstract

Denaturation and renaturation of the adenovirus-2 chromosome (a duplex rod) generates single-stranded circles of unit length. These circles can be opened into linear DNA molecules by digestion with exonuclease III, indicating that hydrogen bonding between the two ends of an adenovirus strand is responsible for maintaining the rod in a circular state.

The formation of adenovirus single-stranded circles, and their sensitivity to exonuclease III, indicate that the mature adenovirus-2 DNA molecule contains an inverted terminal repetition. That is, the base sequence at one end of the molecule is inverted and appears again at the other end of the molecule. This is the first example of such a structure, and its function is unknown.

Keywords: structure of viral DNA, electron microscopy

Full text

PDF
3055

Images in this article

Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

  1. Brutlag D., Kornberg A. Enzymatic synthesis of deoxyribonucleic acid. 36. A proofreading function for the 3' leads to 5' exonuclease activity in deoxyribonucleic acid polymerases. J Biol Chem. 1972 Jan 10;247(1):241–248. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  2. Davis R. W., Hyman R. W. A study in evolution: the DNA base sequence homology between coliphages T7 and T3. J Mol Biol. 1971 Dec 14;62(2):287–301. doi: 10.1016/0022-2836(71)90428-1. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  3. Dressler D., Wolfson J., Magazin M. Initiation and reinitiation of DNA synthesis during replication of bacteriophage T7. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1972 Apr;69(4):998–1002. doi: 10.1073/pnas.69.4.998. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  4. Green M., Piña M., Kimes R., Wensink P. C., MacHattie L. A., Thomas C. A., Jr Adenovirus DNA. I. Molecular weight and conformation. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1967 May;57(5):1302–1309. doi: 10.1073/pnas.57.5.1302. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  5. HARTMAN K. A., Jr, RICH A. THE TAUTOMERIC FORM OF HELICAL POLYRIBOCYTIDYLIC ACID. J Am Chem Soc. 1965 May 5;87:2033–2039. doi: 10.1021/ja01087a031. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  6. Hershey A. D., Burgi E., Ingraham L. COHESION OF DNA MOLECULES ISOLATED FROM PHAGE LAMBDA. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1963 May;49(5):748–755. doi: 10.1073/pnas.49.5.748. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  7. Ikeda H., Tomizawa J. Prophage P1, and extrachromosomal replication unit. Cold Spring Harb Symp Quant Biol. 1968;33:791–798. doi: 10.1101/sqb.1968.033.01.091. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  8. Kelly T. J., Jr, Rose J. A. Simian virus 40 integration site in an adenovirus 7-simian virus 40 hybrid DNA molecule. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1971 May;68(5):1037–1041. doi: 10.1073/pnas.68.5.1037. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  9. LANGRIDGE R., RICH A. Molecular structure of helical polycytidylic acid. Nature. 1963 May 25;198:725–728. doi: 10.1038/198725a0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  10. RICH A., DAVIES D. R., CRICK F. H., WATSON J. D. The molecular structure of polyadenylic acid. J Mol Biol. 1961 Feb;3:71–86. doi: 10.1016/s0022-2836(61)80009-0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  11. RICHARDSON C. C., LEHMAN I. R., KORNBERG A. A DEOXYRIBONUCLEIC ACID PHOSPHATASE-EXONUCLEASE FROM ESCHERICHIA COLI. II. CHARACTERIZATION OF THE EXONUCLEASE ACTIVITY. J Biol Chem. 1964 Jan;239:251–258. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  12. STRACK H. B., KAISER A. D. ON THE STRUCTURE OF THE ENDS OF LAMBADA DNA. J Mol Biol. 1965 May;12:36–49. doi: 10.1016/s0022-2836(65)80280-7. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  13. Schlesinger R. W. Adenoviruses: the nature of the virion and of controlling factors in productive or abortive infection and tumorigenesis. Adv Virus Res. 1969;14:1–61. doi: 10.1016/s0065-3527(08)60556-4. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  14. Wolfson J., Dressler D., Magazin M. Bacteriophage T7 DNA replication: a linear replicating intermediate (gradient centrifugation-electron microscopy-E. coli-DNA partial denaturation). Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1972 Feb;69(2):499–504. doi: 10.1073/pnas.69.2.499. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  15. Wolfson J., Dressler D. Regions of single-stranded DNA in the growing points of replicating bacteriophage T7 chromosomes. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1972 Sep;69(9):2682–2686. doi: 10.1073/pnas.69.9.2682. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  16. Wu R., Taylor E. Nucleotide sequence analysis of DNA. II. Complete nucleotide sequence of the cohesive ends of bacteriophage lambda DNA. J Mol Biol. 1971 May 14;57(3):491–511. doi: 10.1016/0022-2836(71)90105-7. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Articles from Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America are provided here courtesy of National Academy of Sciences

RESOURCES