A glycol nucleic acid (GNA) with an acyclic propylene glycol phosphodiester backbone forms stable antiparallel duplexes following the Watson-Crick base pairing rules.

Nucleosides and nucleotides are powerful building units for creating functional molecules with novel properties. The structural and functional variations of these biomolecules have caused a renaissance of nucleic acid chemistry and biology, and paved the way for fresh avenues in nucleic acid research, including therapeutics, nucleic acid biology, structure-function studies, catalytic and mechan...

With the increase in the number of large, 3D, high-resolution nucleic acid structures, particularly of the 30S and 50S ribosomal subunits and the intact bacterial ribosome, advancements in the visualization of nucleic acid structural features are essential. Large molecular structures are complicated and detailed, and one goal of visualization software is to allow the user to simplify the displa...

ECENT evidence suggests that it is possible to effect transformation of mammalian cells by exogenous nucleic acids.15 Thus the administration of large amounts of nucleic acids to humans as an’ experimental or therapeutic maneuver may be envisaged. Since little is known of the biologic properties of nucleic acids, apart from their pre-eminent role in directing protein synthesis and cell replicat...

Although the immobilization of oligonucleotides (nucleic acid) on mineral surfaces is at basis different biotechnological applications, an atomistic understanding interaction nucleic acid components with titanium dioxide has not yet been achieved. Here, adsorption phosphate anion, four DNA bases (adenine, guanine, thymine, and cytosine) some entire nucleotides dinucleotides TiO2 anatase (1 0 1)...

Cytosine (C) and guanine (G) form Watson-Crick-type complexes in low-dielectric solvents. Dynamics of complexes between 3',5'-bis(triisopropylsilyl) derivatives of 2'-deoxynucleosides in deuteriochloroform were studied with 300-MHz 'H NMR. We have determined rates of rotation about each amino bond of the C:G base pair. From the temperature dependence of the rates of amino group rotation, rotati...

Nanoengineering exploits the interactions of materials at the nanometre scale to create functional nanostructures. It relies on the precise organization of nanomaterials to achieve unique functionality. There are no interactions more elegant than those governing nucleic acids via Watson-Crick base-pairing rules. The infinite combinations of DNA/RNA base pairs and their remarkable molecular reco...

Nucleic acids contain severa' characteristic structural features: a chiral center adjacent to the base, a stereoregular, hydrophilic poly(phosphate-ribose) backbone which is negatively charged at neutral pH, and a helical secondary structure arising from conformational preferences enforced by base-stacking. We have prepared and studied several synthetic polynucleotide analogs having linear poly...

The wide structural diversity of RNA results in part from the diversity of non-Watson-Crick interactions between bases. To examine the repertoire of possible hydrogen bond interactions among bases, we computed databases of base-pairs and base-triples by systematically matching all possible hydrogen-bond donors and acceptors between bases and evaluating the geometries of each planar configuratio...

Hydrogen bonds (H-bonds) formed between nucleobases play an important role in the construction of various nucleic acid structures. The H-donor and H-acceptor pattern of a nucleobase is responsible for selective and correct base pair formation. Herein, we describe an 8-thioadenine nucleobase analogue and an 8-thiohypoxanthine nucleobase analogue with a photolabile 6-nitroveratryl (NV) group on t...