Abstract
With the master molecule of heredity, deoxyribonucleic acid (or DNA), so frequently mentioned in the media — in connections ranging from polymerase chain reaction (PCR) applications (e.g., criminology, medical diagnoses) to cloning and art [1112] — it is difficult to imagine today that it was only a few decades ago when Watson and Crick reported their description of the DNAdouble helix [1354–1356]! Based on analysis of DNA fiber diffraction patterns and Chargaff’s rules, they described a spiral image of an orderly helix — two intertwined polynucleotide chains, with a sugar/phosphate backbone on the exterior and pairs of hydrogen-bondednitrogenous bases in the center. See [622] for a historical perspective of this discovery, including the contribution of all key players (a capsule of which is given in Chapter 1), and anniversary issues of DNA, for example issued in 2003 in many journals (e.g., Nature Vol. 421 and Science Vol. 300) at the occasion of DNA’s golden anniversary.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
In transcription, an RNA polymerase glides along onestrand of the DNA double helix and builds an RNA complement by coupling ribonucleotides through dehydration synthesis. The faithful replicate of one DNA strand then functions as the messenger RNA.
- 2.
In translation, the genetic code of the messenger RNA is read by transferRNA molecules on cellular structures called ribosomes. Every transfer RNA molecule carries a specific sequence of three nucleotides on one end of an L-shaped structure and the corresponding amino acid on the other. The transfer RNA’s main task is to deposit its amino acids on the ribosomes in proper sequence. In this process of matching each messenger-RNA codon with the complementary transfer RNA molecule, the polypeptide chain is assembled. As the amino acids link to one another on the ribosomes, polypeptide folding is thought to begin.
- 3.
For example, N6-methyl-dA is a modified adenine base with the N6H2 (attachment to the ring carbon C6) moiety replaced by N6HCH3; 5-methyl-dC is a modified cytosine where the C5H becomes C5CH3.
- 4.
Two classic tautomerization reactions are keto/enol and amino/imino; the keto and amino forms are typically favored and are shown in Figure 5.2. Keto/enol tautomerization involves alteration of the carbonyl group (–C = O) to a hydroxyl group ( = C–O–H), shifting the double bond from the carbonyl group to the nitrogen-carbon bond in the ring (e.g., C6 = O of G becomes C6–OH, accompanied by the change of H–N1–C6 to N1 = C6). Similarly, an amino/imino tautomerization involves a change in an amino nitrogen –NH2 to an imino form, = NH (e.g., C6–NH2 of A becomes C6 = NH, accompanied by the change of N1 = C6 to H–N1–C6).
- 5.
An ester is an –OR group where R represents an organic chemical group.
- 6.
An adiabatic map is a simple way to examine molecular motionby characteristic low-energy paths along a prescribed reaction coordinate (i.e., variations in specific conformational variables). For each combination of these conformational coordinates, the entire potential energy of the system is minimized to approximate behavior for the motion under study. Though simple in principle, specification of the reaction coordinate is difficult in general, and the neglect of other degrees of freedom in the process is clearly an approximation whose validity depends on the motion in question.
- 7.
Namely, each nucleoside is enveloped in a water sphere of radius 11 Å, and the nonbonded interactions are truncated at 12 Å using a 2 Å buffer region, a potential shift function for the electrostatic terms and a potential switch function for the van der Waals terms; see 10Nonbonded Computationschapter.10.566 for details of such procedures.
- 8.
In a right-handed form, a right hand held with the thumb pointingupward in the direction of the helix axis will wrap right (counterclockwise) and around the axis to follow the chain; a left hand with an upward-pointing thumb will wrap to the left (clockwise) to follow the chain direction of a left-handed helix.
References
C. Altona and M. Sundaralingam. Conformational analysis of the sugar ring in nu- cleosides and nucleotides. a new description using the concept of pseudorotation. J. Amer. Chem. Soc., 94:8205–8212, 1972.
M. Amos. Theoretical and Experimental DNA Computation. Natural Computing Series. Springer, New York, NY, 2005.
K. Arora and T. Schlick. Deoxyadenosine sugar puckering pathway simulated by the stochastic difference equation algorithm. Chem. Phys. Lett., 378:1–8, 2003.
J. F. Atkins and R. Gesteland. The 22nd amino acid. Science, 296:1409–1410, 2002.
P. Ban´aˇs, P. Jureˇcka, N. G. Walter, J. ˇSponer, and M. Otyepka. Theoretical studies of RNA catalysis: Hybrid QM/MM methods and their comparison with MD and QM. Methods, 49:202–216, 2009.
A. D. Bates and A. Maxwell. DNA Topology. In Focus. Oxford University Press, New York, NY, 1993.
Y. Benenson, B. Gil, U. B.-D., R. Adar, and E. Shapiro. An autonomous molecular computer for logical control of gene expression. Nature, 429:423–429, 2004.
H. M. Berman. Hydration of DNA: Take 2. Curr. Opin. Struct. Biol., 4:345–350, 1994.
H. M. Berman. Crystal studies of B-DNA: The answers and the questions. iopolymers, 44:23–44, 1997.
H. M. Berman,W. K. Olson, D. L. Beveridge, J.Westbrook, A. Gelbin, T. Demeny, S.-H. Hsieh, A. R. Srinivasan, and B. Schneider. The nucleic acid database: A com- prehensive relational database of three-dimensional structures of nucleic acids. iophys. J., 63:751–759, 1992.
V. A. Bloomfield, D. M. Crothers, and I. Tinoco, Jr. Nucleic Acids: Structures, Properties, and Functions. University Science Press, New York, NY, 2000.
R. S. Braich, N. Chelyapov, C. Johnson, P. W. K. Rothemund, and L. Adleman. olution of a 20-variable 3-SAT problem on a DNA computer. Science, 296:499–502, 2002.
C. Bustamante. In singulo biochemistry: When less is more. Ann. Rev. Biochem., 77:45–50, 2008.
C. R. Calladine and H. R. Drew. Understanding DNA. The Molecule and How It Works. Academic Press, San Diego, CA, second edition, 1997.
R. Chandrasekaran and S. Arnott. The structure of B-DNA in oriented fibers. . Biomol. Struct. Dynam., 13:1015–1027, 1996.
T. E. Cheatham, III.Molecular modeling and atomistic simulation of nucleic acids. nn. Rev. Comp. Chem., 1:75–89, 2005.
T. E. Cheatham, III and P. A. Kollman. Observation of the A-DNA to B-DNA transition during unrestrained molecular dynamics in aqueous solution. J. Mol. iol., 259:434–444, 1996.
eferences [234] T. K. Chiu and R. E. Dickerson. 1 A crystal structures of B-DNA reveal sequence- specific binding and groove-specific bending of DNA by magnesium and calcium. . Mol. Biol., 301:915–945, 2000.
V. B. Chu, Y. Bai, J. Lipfert, D. Herschlag, and S. Doniach. Evaluation of ion bind- ing to DNA duplexes using a size-modified Poisson-Boltzmann theory. Biophys. J., 93:3202–3209, 2007.
N. R. Cozzarelli and J. C.Wang, editors. DNA Topology and Its Biological Effects. old Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, Cold Spring Harbor, NY, 1990.
D. Cremer and J. A. Pople. A general definition of ring puckering coordinates. . Amer. Chem. Soc., 97:1354–1358, 1975.
eferences [272] F. H. C. Crick. What Mad Pursuit: A Personal View of Scientific Discovery. Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Series. Basic Books, New York, NY, 1988.
T. Darden, L. Perera, L. Li, and L. Pedersen. New tricks for modelers from the crystallography toolkit: The particle mesh Ewald algorithm and its use in nucleic acid simulations. Structure, 7:R55–R60, 1999.
eferences [306] R. E. Dickerson. Definitions and nomenclature of nucleic acid structure parameters. EMBO J., 8:1–4, 1989.
R. E. Dickerson, M. Bansal, C. R. Calladine, S. Diekmann, W. N. Hunter, O. Kennard, E. von Kitzing, R. Lavery, H. C.M. Nelson,W. K. Olson,W. Saenger, Z. Shakked, H. Sklenar, D. M. Soumpasis, C.-S. Tung, A. H.-J. Wang, and V. B. hurkin. Definitions and nomenclature of nucleic acid structure parameters. J. Mol. iol., 208:787–791, 1989.
D. L. Ensign and V. S. Pande. The Fip35 WW domain folds with structural and mechanistic heterogeneity in molecular dynamics simulations. Biophys. J., 96:L53–L55, 2009.
eferences [412] F. Fogolari, A. Brigo, and H. Molinari. The Poisson-Boltzmann equation for biomolecular electrostatics: a tool for structural biology. J. Mol. Recognit., 15:377–392, 2002.
M. C. Foley and T. Schlick. Simulations of dna pol λ R517 mutants indicate 517’s crucial role in ternary complex stability and suggest DNA slippage origin. J. Amer. hem. Soc., 130:3967–3977, 2008.
J. Frank. Three-Dimensional Electron Microscopy of Macromolecular Assemblies. cademic Press, San Diego, CA, 1996.
T. A. Halgren. MMFF VII. Characterization of MMFF94, MMFF94s, and other widely available force fields for conformational energies and for interaction energies and geometries. J. Comput. Chem., 20:730–748, 1999.
U. H. E. Hansmann and Y. Okamoto. New Monte Carlo algorithms for protein folding. Curr. Opin. Struct. Biol., 9:177–183, 1999.
S. C. Harvey, M. Dlakic, J. Griffith, R. Harrington, K. Park, D. Sprous, and W. Zacharias.What is the basis of sequence-directed curvature in DNAs containing A-tracts? J. Biomol. Struct. Dynam., 13:301–307, 1995.
S. C. Harvey,M. Prabhakaran, B. Mao, and J. A.McCammon. Phenylanine transfer RNA: Molecular dynamics simulation. Science, 223:1189–1191, 1984.
S. C. Harvey, R. K.-Z. Tan, and T. E. Cheatham, III. The flying ice cube: Ve- locity rescaling in molecular dynamics leads to violation of energy equipartition. . Comput. Chem., 19:726–740, 1998.
W. L. Jorgensen and J. Tirado-Rives. Potential energy functions for atomic-level simulations of water and organic and biomolecular systems. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. SA, 102:6665–6670, 2005.
J. Khandogin and D. M. York. Quantum mechanical characterization of nucleic acids in solution: A linear-scaling study of charge fluctuations in DNA and RNA. . Phys. Chem. B, 106:7693–7703, 2002.
eferences [660] D. K. Klimov and D. Thirumalai. Stretching single-domain proteins: Phase di- agram and kinetics of force-induced unfolding. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 96:6166–6170, 1999.
A. Korostelev, R. Bertram, and M. S. Chapman. Simulated-annealing real-space refinement as a tool in model building. Acta Cryst., D58:761–767, 2002.
N. B. Leontis, R. B. Altman, H. M. Berman, S. E. Brenner, J. W. Brown, D. R. ngelke, S. C. Harvey, S. R. Holbrook, F. Jossinet, S. E. Lewis, F. Major, D. H. athews, J. Richardson, J. R. Williamson, and E. Westhof. The RNA Ontology Consortium: An open invitation to the RNA community. RNA, 12:533–541, 2006.
C. Levinthal. Are there pathways for protein folding? J. Chim. Physique, 65:44–45, 1969.
M. Levitt and S. Lifson. Refinement of protein conformations using a macromolec- ular energy minimization procedure. J. Mol. Biol., 46:269–279, 1969.
H. Li, W. X. Li, and S. W. Ding. Induction and suppression of RNA silencing by an animal virus. Science, 296:1319–1321, 2002.
A. Machado-Lima, H.A. del Portillo, and A.M. Durham. Computational methods in noncoding RNA research. J. Math. Biol., 56:15–49, 2008.
A. D. MacKerell, Jr. Empirical force fields for biological macromolecules: overview and issues. J. Comput. Chem., 25:1584–1604, 2004.
A. D. MacKerell, Jr., M. Feig, and C. L. Brooks, III. Extending the treatment of backbone energetics in protein force fields: limitations of gas-phase quantum me- chanics in reproducing protein conformational distributions in molecular dynamics simulations. J. Comput. Chem., 25:1400–1415, 2004.
A. D. MacKerell, Jr., M. Feig, and C. L. Brooks, III. Improved treatment of the protein backbone in empirical force fields. J. Amer. Chem. Soc., 126:698–699, 2004.
G. S. Manning, K. K. Ebralidse, A. D. Mirzabekov, and A. Rich. An estimate of the extent of folding of nucleosomal DNA by laterally asymmetric neutralization of phosphate groups. J. Biomol. Struct. Dynam., 6:877–889, 1989.
L. Naldini. A comeback for gene therapy. Science, 326:805–806, 2009.
X. Nassif. A furtive pathogen revealed. Science, 287:1767–1768, 2000.
A. Nicholls and B. Honig. A rapid finite difference algorithm, utilizing succes- sive over-relaxation to solve the Poisson-Boltzmann equation. J. Comput. Chem., 12:435–445, 1991.
W. K. Olson. How flexible is the furanose ring? 2. an updated potential energy estimate. J. Amer. Chem. Soc., 104:278–286, 1982.
W. K. Olson, M. S. Babcock, A. Gorin, G.-H. Liu, N. L. Markey, J. A. Martino, S. C. Pedersen, A. R. Srinivasan, I. Tobias, T. P. Westcott, and P. Zhang. Flexing and folding of double helical DNA. Biol. Chem., 55:7–29, 1995.
J. N. Onuchic, Z. Luthey-Schulten, and P. G. Wolynes. Theory of protein folding: The energy landscape perspective. Annu. Rev. Phys. Chem., 48:545–600, 1997.
M. B. Pepys, J. Herbert, W. L. Hutchinson, G. A. Tennent, H. J. Lachmann, J. R. Gallimore, L. B. Lovat, T. Bartfai, A. Alanine, C. Hertel, T. Hoffmann, R. Jakob-Roetne, R. D. Norcross, J. A. Kemp, K. Yamamura, M. Suzuki, G. W. aylor, S. Murray, D. Thompson, A. Purvis, S. Kolstoe, S. P. Wood, and P. N. awkins. Targeted pharmacological depletion of serum amyloid P component for treatment of human amyloidosis. Nature, 417:254–259, 2002.
A. Peracchi. Prospects for antiviral ribozymes and deoxyribozymes. Rev. Med. irol., 14:47–64, 2004.
D. J. Price and C. L. Brooks, III. Modern protein force fields behave comparably in molecular dynamics simulations. J. Comput. Chem., 23:1045–1057, 2002.
M. Ptashne. How gene activators work. Sci. Amer., 260:41–47, 1989.
M. Rueda, P. Chacon, andM. Orozco. Thorough validation of protein normal mode analysis: a comparative study with essential dynamics. Structure, 15:565–575, 2007.
J. A. Schellman and S. C. Harvey. Static contributions to the persistence length of DNA and dynamic contributions to DNA curvature. Biophys. Chem., 55:95–114, 1995.
T. Schlick. Pursuing Laplace’s vision on modern computers. In J. P. Mesirov, K. Schulten, and D. W. Sumners, editors, Mathematical Applications to Biomo- lecular Structure and Dynamics, volume 82 of IMA Volumes in Mathematics and Its Applications, pages 219–247, New York, NY, 1996. Springer-Verlag.
T. Schlick. Engineering teams up with computer-simulation and visualization tools to probe biomolecular mechanisms. Biophys. J., 85:1, 2003.
T. Schlick. The critical collaboration between art and science: Applying an ex- periment on a bird in an air pump to the ramifications of genomics on society. eonardo, 38:323–329, 2005.
T. Schlick. From macroscopic to mesoscopic models of chromatin folding. In J. Fish, editor, Bridging The Scales in Science in Engineering, pages 514–535. xford University Press, New York, NY, 2009.
E. A. Schultes and D. B. Bartel. One sequence, two ribozymes: Implications for the emergence of new ribozyme folds. Science, 289:448–452, 2000.
M. R. Scott, R. Will, J. Ironside, H.-Oanh B. Nguyen, P. Tremblay, S. J. DeArmond, and S. B. Prusiner. Compelling transgenetic evidence for trans- mission of bovine spongiform encephalopathy prions to humans. Proc. Natl. Acad. ci. USA, 96:15137–15142, 1999.
M. Shirts and V. Pande. Screen savers of the world unite! Science, 290:1903–1904, 2000.
J. C. Simo and N. Tarnow. The discrete energy-momentum method. Conserv- ing algorithms for nonlinear elastodynamics. Z. Angew. Math. Phys., 43:757–793, 1992.
D. Sprous and S. C. Harvey. Action at a distance in supercoiled DNA: Effects of sequences on slither, branching and intermolecular concentration. Biophys. J., 70:1893–1908, 1996.
D. Sprous, M. A. Young, and D. L. Beveridge. Molecular Dynamics Studies of Axis Bending in d(G5-(GA4T4C)2-C5) and d(G5-(GT4A4C)2-C5): Effects of Sequence Polarity on DNA Curvature. J. Mol. Biol., 285:1623–1632, 1999.
E. Vanden-Eijnden, M. Venturoli, G. Ciccotti, and R. Elber. On the assumptions underlying milestoning. J. Chem. Phys., 129:174102, 2008.
K. Vanommeslaeghe, E. Hatcher, C. Acharya, S. Kundu, S. Zhong, J. Shim, E. Darian, O. Guvench, P. Lopes, I. Vorobyov, and Jr. A. D. MacKerell. CHARMM general force field: a force field for drug-like molecules compatible with the CHARMM all-atom additive biological force fields. J. Comput. Chem., 2009. ublished online July 2, 2009; DOI 10.1002/jcc.
Y. N. Vorobjev and J. Hermans. ES/IS: Estimation of conformational free energy by combining dynamics simulations with explicit solvent with an implicit solvent continuum model. Biophys. Chem., 78:195–205, 1999.
R. C.Wade, B.A. Luty, E. Demchuk, J. D. Madura, M. E. Davis, J. M. Briggs, and J. A. McCammon. Simulation of enzyme-substrate encounter with gated active sites. Struct. Biol., 1:65–69, 1994.
A. Warshel, P. K. Sharma, M. Kato, Y. Xiang, H. Liu, and M. H. M. Olson. lectrostatic basis for enzyme catalysis. Chem. Rev., 106:3210–3235, 2006.
M. Watanabe and M. Karplus. Simulations of macromolecules by multiple time- step methods. J. Phys. Chem., 99:5680–5697, 1995.
M.S. Waterman and T.F. Smith. RNA secondary structure: A complete mathemat- ical analysis. Math. Biosci., 42:257–266, 1978.
R. H. Waterston, E. S. Lander, and J. E. Sulston. On the sequencing of the human genome. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 99:3712–3716, 2002.
B. T. Wimberly, D. E. Brodersen, W. M. Clemons Jr., R. J. Morgan-Warren, A. P. Carter, C. Vonrhein, T. Hartsch, and V. Ramakrishnan. Structure of the 30S ribosomal subunit. Nature, 407:327–339, 2000.
H. Yamakawa. Modern Theory of Polymer Solutions. Harper and Row Publishers, New York, NY, 1971.
T. Yoda, Y. Sugita, and Y. Okamoto. Secondary-structure preferences of force fields for proteins evaluated by generalized-ensemble simulations. Chem. Phys., 307:269–283, 2004.
Y. Yonetani, Y. Maruyama, F. Hirata, and H. Kono. Comparison of DNA hydration patterns obtained using two distinct computational methods, molecular dynam- ics simulation and three-dimensional reference interactions site model theory. . Chem. Phys., 128:185102, 2008.
D. M. York, T.-S. Lee, and W. Yang. Parameterization and efficient implemen- tation of a solvent model for linear-scaling semiempirical quantum-mechanical calculations of biological macromolecules. Chem. Phys. Lett., 263:297–304, 1996.
D. M. York, W. Yang, H. Lee, T. Darden, and L. G. Pederson. Toward the accurate modeling of DNA: The importance of long-range electrostatics. J. Amer. Chem. oc., 117:5001–5002, 1995.
eferences [1441] Q. Zhang, D. Beard,, and T. Schlick. Constructing irregular surfaces to enclose macromolecular complexes for mesoscale modeling using the discrete surface charge optimization (DiSCO) algorithm. J. Comput. Chem., 24:2063–2074, 2003.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2010 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Schlick, T. (2010). Nucleic Acids Structure Minitutorial. In: Molecular Modeling and Simulation: An Interdisciplinary Guide. Interdisciplinary Applied Mathematics, vol 21. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-6351-2_5
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-6351-2_5
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-1-4419-6350-5
Online ISBN: 978-1-4419-6351-2
eBook Packages: Mathematics and StatisticsMathematics and Statistics (R0)