title: Analysis of DNA strand cleavage at abasic sites.
abstract: Abasic sites in DNA arise under a variety of circumstances, including destabilization of bases through oxidative stress, as an intermediate in base excision repair, and through spontaneous loss. Their persistence can yield a blockade to RNA transcription and DNA synthesis and can be a source of mutations. Organisms have developed an enzymatic means of repairing abasic sites in DNA that generally involves a DNA repair pathway that is initiated by a repair protein creating a phosphodiester break ("nick") adjacent to the site of base loss. Here we describe a method for analyzing the manner in which repair endonucleases differ in the way they create nicks in DNA and how to distinguish between them using cellular crude extracts.
authors.affiliation: Pennington Biomedical Research Center, Louisiana State University, 6400 Perkins, Baton Rouge, LA, 70808, USA, deutscwa@pbrc.edu.
authors.forename: Walter A
authors.initials: WA
authors.lastname: Deutsch
authors.forename: Vijay
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Hegde
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001080:Apurinic Acid / Q000235:genetics; D053837:DNA Cleavage; D004249:DNA Damage; D004260:DNA Repair; D043603:DNA-(Apurinic or Apyrimidinic Site) Lyase / Q000737:chemistry / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D006868:Hydrolysis; D009841:Oligonucleotides / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics; D018384:Oxidative Stress
chemical_list: D009841:Oligonucleotides; D001080:Apurinic Acid; D043603:DNA-(Apurinic or Apyrimidinic Site) Lyase