In the 1950s research established that purulent lung secretion from patients with cystic fibrosis (CF) contained large amounts of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) (Chernick & Guilio, 1959; Potter et al, 1960; Shak et al, 1990). These high levels of extra cellular DNA are released from degenerating neutrophils (white cells) and accumulate within the airways in response to either chronic infection or ...

elomeric proteins may have an unexpected connection to the mitotic spindle. On page 819, Xu and Blackburn provide evidence that the human homologue of a yeast telomere-binding protein is found on anaphase midzone microtubules. The telomeric functions of the human and yeast versions of this protein, Rif1, have diverged during evolution. In budding yeast, Rif1 is a telomere-bound negative regulat...

Ischemia/reperfusion is known to result in DNA fragmentation and cell death in kidney tubular epithelium, but the endonucleases responsible for this DNA damage have not been identified. DNA substrate gel analysis of extracts from normal rat kidney cortex revealed the presence of a DNase with an apparent molecular mass of 30 to 34 kD. This enzyme is not a dimer of the previously described nuclea...

DNase I requires Ca²+ and Mg²+ for hydrolyzing double-stranded DNA. However, the number and the location of DNase I ion-binding sites remain unclear, as well as the role of these counter-ions. Using molecular dynamics simulations, we show that bovine pancreatic (bp) DNase I contains four ion-binding pockets. Two of them strongly bind Ca²+ while the other two sites coordinate Mg²+. These theoret...

The deoxyribonuclease of various tissues is not only intrinsically interesting, but this enzyme must be considered in the development and application of procedures for the isolation of undegraded deoxyribonucleic acids and nucleoproteins. For this purpose it is particularly desirable to know the intracellular distribution of DNasel and to have information concerning factors which modify the enz...

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is characterised by the production of autoantibodies against ubiquitous antigens, especially nuclear components. Evidence makes it clear that the development of these autoantibodies is an antigen-driven process and that immune complexes involving DNA-containing antigens play a key role in the disease process. In rodents, DNase I is the major endonuclease prese...

In this study, the effects of DNase treatment on the specificity of reverse transcription (RT)-PCR have been investigated on different samples, containing RNA, DNA, DNA/RNA and DNA/cDNA. This was to evaluate the possibilities of getting specific results in a direct in situ RT-PCR. All DNA targets in the samples were eliminated after 1 h of DNase treatment. However, some DNA fragments still rema...