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. 1987 Mar;84(6):1624–1628. doi: 10.1073/pnas.84.6.1624

Large palindromes in the lambda phage genome are preserved in a rec+ host by inhibiting lambda DNA replication.

C E Shurvinton, M M Stahl, F W Stahl
PMCID: PMC304488  PMID: 2951734

Abstract

A large palindrome carried by phage lambda has been shown to prevent growth of the phage on a rec+ strain of Escherichia coli. The phage do form plaques on recBC sbcB strains, but the palindrome is not stable--deletions that either destroy the palindrome or diminish its size overgrow the original engineered palindrome-containing phage. We have prepared stocks of lambda carrying a palindrome that is 2 X 4200 base pairs long. These phage stocks are produced by induction of a lysogen in which the two halves of the palindrome are stored at opposite ends of the prophage and are of sufficient titer (10(9) phage per ml) to enable one-step growth experiments with replication-blocked phage. We find that the large palindrome as well as a lesser palindrome of 2 X 265 base pairs are recovered intact among particles carrying unreplicated chromosomes following such an infection of a rec+ host. We propose that DNA replication drives the extrusion of palindromic sequences in vivo, forming secondary structures that are substrates for the recBC and sbcB gene products.

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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