Publications Repository - Gdańsk University of Technology

The structure of B-DNA, the physiological form of the DNA molecule, has been a central topic in biology, chemistry and physics. Far from uniform and rigid, the double helix was revealed as a flexible and structurally polymorphic molecule. Conformational changes that lead to local and global changes in the helix geometry are mediated by a complex choreography of base and backbone rearrangements affecting the ability of the B-DNA to recognize ligands and consequently on its functionality. In this sense, the knowledge obtained from the sequence-dependent structural properties of B-DNA has always been thought crucial to rationalize how ligands and, most notably, proteins recognize B-DNA and modulate its activity, i.e. the structural basis of gene regulation. Honouring the anniversary of the first high-resolution X-ray structure of a B-DNA molecule, in this contribution, we present the most important discoveries of the last 40 years on the sequence-dependent structural and dynamical properties of B-DNA, from the early beginnings to the current frontiers in the field.

Authors

• Gabriela da Rosa,
• Leandro Grille,
• Victoria Calzada,
• Katya Ahmad,
• Juan Pablo Arcon,
• Federica Battistini,
• Genís Bayarri,
• Thomas Bishop,
• Paolo Carloni,
• Thomas Cheatham III,
• Rosana Collepardo-Guevara,
• prof. dr hab. inż. Jacek Czub link open in new tab ,
• Jorge R. Espinosa,
• Rodrigo Galindo-Murillo,
• Sarah A. Harris,
• Adam Hospital,
• Charles Laughton,
• John H. Maddocks,
• Agnes Noy,
• Modesto Orozco,
• Marco Pasi,
• Alberto Pérez,
• Daiva Petkevičiūtė-Gerlach,
• Rahul Sharma,
• Ran Sun,
• Pablo D. Dans