Fig. 2.

Recombination between supplementing 5^′ and 3^′ fragments of an RQ RNA. A: Nucleotides that become joined (connected with yellow lines) in the recombinants generated in the presence of Qβ replicase (Samatov, T.R. and Chetverin, A.B., unpublished data). B: Same in the absence of any protein [14]. Black letters indicate sequences derived from RQ135 RNA [21], colored letters indicate artificial extensions of the fragments, red letters indicate homologous segments. C: Time course of the generation of replicable RNAs by self-recombination from the 5^′ and 3^′ fragments at 37 °C in the presence of 10 mM MgCl₂ and buffer (10 mM Tris–HCl, pH 8.0, 100 mM NaCl, 1 mM EDTA) [14]. RNA colonies are detected by hybridization with ³²P-labeled probes.