Abstract
The basic principle of the DNA footprinting technique is the measurement of accessibility of the DNA using a probe. The probe can be any enzyme or a chemical reagent that is able to cut the DNA backbone. When the target DNA is a fragment containing a signal sequence for a sequence-specific binding protein, sites on the DNA that interact with the protein are inaccessible to the probe. After electrophoretic separation based on molecular weight, these inaccessible sites appear as blanks in an otherwise regular DNA cleavage pattern, thus revealing the characteristic interaction footprint for the binding protein.
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Further Reading
Tullius, Th. D. (1989) Physical studies of protein-DNA complexes by footprinting. Annu. Rev. Biophys. Biophys. Chem. 18, 213–237.
Tullius, Th. D. (1989) Structural studies of DNA through cleavage by the hydroxyl radical, in Nucleic Acids and Molecular Biology, vol. 3, (Eckstein, F. and Lilley, D., eds.), Springer-Verlag, Heildelberg, Germany, pp. 1–12.
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© 2001 Humana Press Inc., Totowa, NJ
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Zaychikov, E., Schickor, P., Denissova, L., Heumann, H. (2001). Hydroxyl Radical Footprinting. In: Moss, T. (eds) DNA-Protein Interactions. Methods in Molecular Biology, vol 148. Humana Press. https://doi.org/10.1385/1-59259-208-2:049
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1385/1-59259-208-2:049
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