title: Alkaline titrations of poly(dG-dC).poly(dG-dC): microemulsion versus solution behavior.
abstract: PolyGC was titrated with a strong base in the presence of increasing concentrations of NaCl (from 0.00 to 0.60M) either in water solution or with the polynucleotide solubilized in the aqueous core of reverse micelles, i.e., the cationic quaternary water-in-oil microemulsion CTAB/n-hexane/n-pentanol/water. The results for matched samples in the two media were compared. CD and UV spectroscopies and, for the solution experiments, pH measurements were used to follow the course of deprotonation. In both media the primary effect of the addition of base was denaturation of the polynucleotide, reversible by back-titration with a strong acid. In solution, the apparent pK(a) of the transition decreases with increasing the salt concentration and a roughly linear dependence of pK(a) on p[NaCl] has been found. A parallel monotonic decay with ionic strength has been found in solution for R(OH), defined as the number of hydroxyl ions required per monomeric unit of polyGC to reach half-transition. By contrast, in microemulsion, R(OH) has been found to be independent of the NaCl concentration (and 10 to 50 times lower than in solution). This result is proposed as an indirect evidence of the independence of pK(a) on the salt concentration in microemulsion, where the pH cannot be measured. A sort of buffering effect of the positive charges on the micellar wall and of their counter-ions on the ionic strength could well explain this discrepancy of behavior in the two media.
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Chimica Inorganica e Analitica Stanislao Cannizzaro, Universita di Palermo, Viale delle Scienze, Pad. 17, 90128 Palermo, Italy.
authors.forename: Marta
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Airoldi
authors.forename: Giuseppe
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Gennaro
authors.forename: Marcello
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Giomini
authors.forename: Anna Maria
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Giuliani
authors.forename: Mauro
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Giustini
mesh_terms: D000077286:Cetrimonium; D002593:Cetrimonium Compounds; D002942:Circular Dichroism; D004655:Emulsions; D005612:Freeze Drying; D006863:Hydrogen-Ion Concentration; D009690:Nucleic Acid Conformation; D011089:Polydeoxyribonucleotides / Q000737:chemistry*; D012996:Solutions
chemical_list: D002593:Cetrimonium Compounds; D004655:Emulsions; D011089:Polydeoxyribonucleotides; D012996:Solutions; C019530:poly(dC-dG); D000077286:Cetrimonium