Article
Knotting probability of DNA molecules confined in restricted volumes: DNA knotting in phage capsids.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America - 16 Apr 2002
Arsuaga Javier, Vázquez Mariel, Trigueros Sonia, Sumners De Witt, Roca Joaquim
Abstract excerpt
When linear double-stranded DNA is packed inside bacteriophage capsids, it becomes highly compacted. However, the phage is believed to be fully effective only if the DNA is not entangled. Nevertheless, when DNA is extracted from a tailless mutant of the P4 phage, DNA is found to be cyclic and knotted (probability of 0.95). The knot spectrum is very complex, and most of the knots have a large number of crossings....
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