Interaction of poly-L-lysine with nucleic acids. II. Poly(A+U), poly(A+2U), and rice dwarf virus RNA

The optical density–temperature profile of double-stranded poly(A + U), triple stranded poly(A + 2U), and double-stranded RNA from rice dwarf virus in solutions with and without poly-L -lysine has been examined. When poly-L -lysine is added, more than one melting temperature T_m is observed for poly(A + U) and poly(A + 2U). One of them is considered to correspond to the melting of the polynucleotide molecule free from poly-L -lysine, and another to the melting of a polynucleotide–poly-L -lysine complex. For rice dwarf virus RNA, the T_m assignable to the complex is not found to be lower than 99°C. In every case, however, the hyperchromicity observed at the T_m of the free poly-nucleotide molecule is lowered linearly as the amount of poly-L -lysine added to the solution increases. This fact is taken as indicating that there is a stoichiometric complex formed. The stoichiometric ratio lysine/nucleotide in each complex is determined by examining the relation between the amount of poly-L -lysine added to the solution and the percentage of hyperchromicity remaining at T_m of the free polynucleotide molecule. The ratio is found to be 2/3 for all of the three complexes. A discussion is given on the molecular conformations of four types of polynucleotide–polylysine complex hitherto found: (A) double-stranded DNA plus poly-L -lysine in which the lyslne/nucleotide ratio is 1, (B) three-stranded RNA [poly(A + 2U)] plus poly-L -lysine in which the ratio is 2/3, (C) double-stranded RNA [poly (A + U) or rice dwarf virus RNA] plus poly-L -lysine in which the ratio is 2/3, and (D) double-stranded RNA [poly(I + C)] plus poly-L -lysine in which the ratio is 1/2.