Biopolym. Cell. 1988; 4(4):203-211.
Structure and Function of Biopolymers
Capillary viscoelastometry of eukaryotic nucleoids
1Blokhin D. Yu., 1Struchkov V. A.
  1. All-Union Cancer Research Centre, Academy of Medical Sciences of the USSR
    Moscow, USSR

Abstract

The method of capillary viscoelastometry was used to study structural peculiarities of supramolecular complexes (SC DNA) at different levels of their organization (nucleoids and alkaline lysates) in eukaryotic cells mud loach sperm, P388, L1210, S37. The dependence of SC DNA viscoelasticity on time of lysic and ionic strength was studied. Velocity constants of nucleoid relaxation of various eukaryotic cells are shown to be significantly different. The curves of viscoelastometric titration of nucleoid of this eukaryotic cells with the ethidium bromide has a biphasic shape typical of supercoiled DNA, obtained by sedimentation. It is detected that the change in viscoelasticitic characteristics of L1210 nucleoids is not due to the action of endogenic proteases, since the electrophoretic composition of nucleoid proteins remained constant. Under these experimental conditions the nucleases were not active too. The method of capillary viscoelastometry appears to be enough informative and sensitive in studies of SC DNA properties.

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