Global Analysis of Distribution and Preference of A-Tract in Bacteria and Archaea Genomes

摘要

Intrinsic curvature of DNA influences many biological functions, including transcription, replication, and recombination. Several proteins involved in nucleoid structure ("nucleoid proteins") bind preferentially to curved DNA. We have developed a method for analyzing globally distributing curved structure in bacteria and archaea genomes. Recently, it was reported that nucleoid structure is related to runs of successive adenine bases (A/T-tracts). In order to understand genome structure in view of distribution of curved DNA, we have compared the frequency of A_n/T_n-tract with G_n/C_n-tract (n=1, ..., 9) in bacteria and archaea genomes.