{"doi":"10.1073/pnas.88.20.9072","title":"Site-specific effect of thymine dimer formation on dAn.dTn tract bending and its biological implications.","abstract":"<jats:p>dAn.dTn sequences, otherwise known as A tracts, are hotspots for cis-syn thymine dimer formation and deletion mutations induced by UV light. Such A tracts are also known to bend DNA, suggesting that some biological effects of UV light might be related to the distinctive structure and properties of cis-syn dimer-containing A tracts. To investigate the effect of thymine dimer formation on A-tract bending multimers of all possible dimer monoadducts of a dA6.dT6-containing decamer known to bend DNA were prepared along with multimers of a dimer-containing 21-mer of heterogeneous sequence. The characteristic anomalous electrophoretic behavior of the phased A-tract multimers was essentially abolished by dimer formation at the center of the A tract and was only slightly reduced by dimer formation at the ends. These effects are attributed to disruption of the A-tract structure at the site of the dimer, resulting in intact A tracts of reduced length and, hence, reduced bending. This model was suggested by the ability to formulate the estimated bend angles of the dimer-containing A tracts as approximately equal to the sum of the bend angles induced by the dimer and the remaining intact portion of the A tract. Contrary to a previous experimental study that concluded that the thymine dimer bends DNA by approximately 30 degrees, the dimer was determined to bend DNA by only approximately 7 degrees. Reduction of the bending of a DNA sequence by dimer formation may have a number of unpredicted and important biological consequences.</jats:p>","journal":"Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences","year":1991,"id":36093,"datarank":5.176444787937708,"base_score":4.624972813284271,"endowment":4.624972813284271,"self_citation_contribution":0.6937459219926407,"citation_network_contribution":4.482698865945067,"self_endowment_contribution":0.6937459219926407,"citer_contribution":4.482698865945067,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":101,"citer_count":91,"citers_with_citation_signal":82,"citers_with_endowment":82,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":null,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":false,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":null,"fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":183478,"name":"J S Taylor","orcid":null,"position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":183477,"name":"C I Wang","orcid":null,"position":0,"is_corresponding":false}],"reference_count":0,"raw_metadata":{"has_enrichment":true,"base_score":4.624972813284271,"endowment":4.624972813284271,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"views":0,"has_version_chain":false,"is_dataset":false,"is_oa":false,"pmid":"1924370","pmcid":"PMC52654","openalex_id":"https://openalex.org/W2041642148","authors":[],"funders":[],"total_grants":0,"fwci":1.2756,"citation_percentile":0.79509155,"influential_citations":0,"citation_trend":[{"year":2012,"count":2},{"year":2013,"count":1},{"year":2014,"count":3},{"year":2015,"count":3},{"year":2016,"count":1},{"year":2017,"count":3},{"year":2018,"count":2},{"year":2019,"count":2},{"year":2020,"count":4},{"year":2021,"count":3},{"year":2022,"count":3},{"year":2024,"count":2},{"year":2025,"count":1}],"oa_status":"green","license":null,"oa_locations":[{"url":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/52654","host_type":"repository"},{"url":"https://europepmc.org/articles/pmc52654?pdf=render","host_type":"GREEN"},{"url":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/52654","host_type":"repository"},{"url":"https://pnas.org/doi/pdf/10.1073/pnas.88.20.9072","host_type":"publisher"},{"url":"https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.88.20.9072","host_type":"journal"},{"url":"https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1924370","host_type":"repository"}],"fields_of_study":["DNA and Nucleic Acid Chemistry","Advanced biosensing and bioanalysis techniques","Chemistry","Medicine","Biology","Base Composition","Base Sequence","Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid","DNA","DNA Damage","DNA Repair","Molecular Sequence Data","Nucleic Acid Conformation","Oligodeoxyribonucleotides","Pyrimidine Dimers","Structure-Activity Relationship","Ultraviolet Rays"],"mesh_terms":["Base Composition","Base Sequence","Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid","DNA","DNA Damage","DNA Repair","Molecular Sequence Data","Nucleic Acid Conformation","Oligodeoxyribonucleotides","Pyrimidine Dimers","Structure-Activity Relationship","Ultraviolet Rays"],"keywords":["Dimer","Pyrimidine dimer","DNA","Thymine","Crystallography","Chemistry","Biophysics","Stereochemistry","Biology","Biochemistry","DNA damage"],"sdg_mappings":[],"linked_datasets":[],"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"database_accessions":[],"source":"live","citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-06-10T14:17:43.830993Z","pmid":null,"pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}