Journal Article

Discrimination of oligonucleotides of different lengths with a wild-type aerolysin nanopore

Long, Yi-Tao, Cao, Chan, Hu, Zheng-Li, Tian, He, Ying, Yi-Lun, Liao, Dong-Fang

2016

Overview

Protein nanopores offer an inexpensive, label-free method of analysing single oligonucleotides. The sensitivity of the approach is largely determined by the characteristics of the pore-forming protein employed, and typically relies on nanopores that have been chemically modified or incorporate molecular motors. Effective, high-resolution discrimination of oligonucleotides using wild-type biological nanopores remains difficult to achieve. Here, we show that a wild-type aerolysin nanopore can resolve individual short oligonucleotides that are 2 to 10 bases long. The sensing capabilities are attributed to the geometry of aerolysin and the electrostatic interactions between the nanopore and the oligonucleotides. We also show that the wild-type aerolysin nanopores can distinguish individual oligonucleotides from mixtures and can monitor the stepwise cleavage of oligonucleotides by exonuclease I. A wild-type aerolysin nanopore can resolve individual short oligonucleotides that are 2 to 10 bases long, and can monitor the stepwise cleavage of oligonucleotides by exonuclease I.

• Publisher: Nature Publishing Group UK,Nature Publishing Group
• Subject: 132/124 / 631/61/350/1058 / 639/925/350/1058 / Bacterial Toxins - chemistry / Bandwidths / Cleavage / Discrimination / Electrostatics / Hydrogen-Ion Concentration / Materials Science / Monitors / Nanopores / Nanostructure / Nanotechnology / Nanotechnology - methods / Nanotechnology and Microengineering / Oligonucleotides / Oligonucleotides - analysis / Oligonucleotides - chemistry / Oligonucleotides - isolation & purification / Pore Forming Cytotoxic Proteins - chemistry / Proteins / Static Electricity