A direct measurement of the unzippering rate of a nucleic acid double helix

The rate of double helix unzippering was determined directly by application of a fast temperature jump method to a nucleotide system of partly unzippered helices formed from oligoriboadenylates and oligoribouridylates of equal chain lengths (14 and 18 nucleotide residues). These helices showed a relaxation process in the time range of 0.1 to 0.3 μsec, that is assigned to the unzippering reaction. Measurements at 0.05 M and 0.1 M Na⁺] demonstrated a rather small dependence upon the ionic strength. Increase of temperature increases the rate of unzippering. Simulation of the unzippering relaxation by a zipper model yielded a rate constant of base pair formation adjacent to a helix sequence of 8 × 10⁶ sec^?1 at 25°C associated with an activation enthalpy of 4 $\text{kcal}\text{mole}$. This elementary rate constant is higher than that obtained from a simulation of the overall recombination and dissociation rates of entire helices. The difference is attributed to reduced electrostatic and steric hindrance effects for base pair equilibration at helix ends.