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. 1974 Jan;1(1):109–127. doi: 10.1093/nar/1.1.109

Thermodynamic and kinetic properties of short RNA helices: the oligomer sequence AnGCUn

Jeffrey Ravetch 1, Jay Gralla 1, DM Crothers 1
PMCID: PMC343329  PMID: 10793665

Abstract

We studied the thermodynamic, kinetic and optical properties of the double helices formed by the series of self-complementary oligonucleotides, (AP)nGpC(pU)n, 2 ≤ n ≤ 4, and found that the shortest helix, containing just 6 base pairs, is less stable than would be predicted from the properties of the larger molecules. It also shows a markedly smaller hyperchromism on melting than expected. These anomalous properties of a short helix indicate that one cannot always assume that base pair free energies and extinction coefficient changes are independent of helix size.

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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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