遗传学实验技术

Gene gun-mediated delivery of allergen-encoding plasmid DNA has been in focus for many years now as being a needle-free alternative to the protein-based desensitization regimen used in specific immunotherapy. Biolistic immunization with the Helios gene gun has proven to be potent in the ...

DiOlistic labeling utilizes a particle-mediated delivery system to incorporate dye into cells. Because of its random nature, this technique generates sparse fluorescent labeling which is well suited for the study of neuronal dendritic branching and dendritic spine morphology. D ...

The DNA damage response can be initiated in response to a variety of stress signals that are encountered during physiological processes or in response to exogenous cues, such as ionizing radiation or DNA-damaging therapeutic agents. A number of methods have been developed to examine the mor ...

The deleterious effects of DNA damage on DNA replication have been demonstrated in many model systems and the mechanisms of the resulting inhibition have been a research focus for at least 40 years. Moreover, recent studies have identified several major components of the S-phase checkpoint, ...

Modification of the replicative sliding clamp, PCNA, by monoubiquitin, polyubiquitin, and SUMO contributes to the processing of DNA damage during replication. In order to investigate the properties of the relevant conjugation enzymes, their interactions, substrate recognit ...

PCNA modifications by members of the ubiquitin family are associated with a range of different transactions during replication of damaged and undamaged DNA. This chapter describes detailed protocols for the detection and isolation of ubiquitin and SUMO conjugates of PCNA from total b ...

Translesion DNA synthesis (TLS) is a DNA damage tolerance mechanism, in which specialized low-fidelity DNA polymerases bypass lesions that interfere with replication. This process is inherently mutagenic due to the miscoding nature of DNA lesions, but it prevents double strand brea ...

The in vitro replication assay described here measures bidirectional replication of a circular double- stranded DNA template upon initiation at the SV40 origin. It models a single eukaryotic replication unit (replicon) and recapitulates the biochemical steps involved in the cata ...

DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs) are caused by endogenous cellular processes such as oxidative metabolism, or by exogenous events like exposure to ionizing radiation or other genotoxic agents. Repair of these DSBs is essential for the maintenance of cellular genomic integrity. In human ...

Recent genetic and biochemical studies have provided important insights into the mechanism of nonhomologous end joining (NHEJ) pathways in higher eukaryotes, and have facilitated the functional characterization of several of its components including DNA-PKcs, Ku, DNA ligase IV, ...

Fluorescence microscopy of the DNA damage response in living cells stands out from many other DNA repair assays by its ability to monitor the response to individual DNA lesions in single cells. This is particularly true in yeast, where the frequency of spontaneous DNA lesions is relatively low co ...

The immunoglobulin loci of the genetically tractable chicken B cell line DT40 provide a unique opportunity to study the cellular response to endogenously generated DNA damage in a chromosomal context. Abasic sites generated by the concerted action of Activation-Induced Deaminase ( ...

The electrophoretic mobility shift assay (EMSA) can be used to study proteins that bind to DNA structures created by DNA-damaging agents. UV-damaged DNA-binding protein (UV-DDB), which is involved in nucleotide excision repair, binds to DNA damaged by ultraviolet radiation or the antic ...

The chicken B cell line DT40 has been widely used as a model system for reverse genetics studies in higher eukaryotes, because of its advantages including efficient gene targeting and ease of chromosome manipulation. Although the genetic approach using the RNA interference technique has b ...

The soil nematode Caenorhabditis elegans has become a popular genetic model organism used to study a broad range of complex biological processes, including development, aging, apoptosis, and DNA damage responses. Many genetic tools and tricks have been developed in C. elegans including ...

Exposure to DNA-damaging agents invokes biological responses necessary for damage recovery and cell survival. Despite the presence of intact DNA repair pathways, lack of certain other biological pathways has been shown to sensitize cells to DNA-damaging agents’ exposure. It is likely ...

This introduction to the book: DNA repair protocols: third edition, edited by Bjergbaek, discusses the history and more recent developments in the field of DNA repair. This research field started in the 1950 and developed from a small group of researchers interested in the damage caused to DNA by ul ...

The yeast comet assay is a fast, sensitive, and inexpensive technique to measure oxidative DNA damage, DNA damage repair, and the genotoxic or protective effects of chemicals. The main advantage over the comet assay using cells of higher organisms is the genetic tractability and ease of cultiv ...

Comet fluorescence in situ hybridization (Comet-FISH) is a useful method to detect overall and region-specific DNA damage in individual cells. Two well-established methods are combined, the Comet assay (single cell gel electrophoresis) and fluorescence in situ hybridization (F ...

This chapter was written as a guide to using the long-amplicon quantitative PCR (QPCR) assay for the measurement of DNA damage in mammalian as well as nonmammalian species such as Caenorhabditis elegans (nematodes), Drosophila melanogaster (fruit flies), and two species of fish (Fundulus ...