ABSTRACT
Initiation of simian virus 40 (SV40) DNA replication is dependent upon the assembly of two T-antigen (T-ag) hexamers on the SV40 core origin. To further define the oligomerization mechanism, the pentanucleotide requirements for T-ag assembly were investigated. Here, we demonstrate that individual pentanucleotides support hexamer formation, while particular pairs of pentanucleotides suffice for the assembly of T-ag double hexamers. Related studies demonstrate that T-ag double hexamers formed on “active pairs” of pentanucleotides catalyze a set of previously described structural distortions within the core origin. For the four-pentanucleotide-containing wild-type SV40 core origin, footprinting experiments indicate that T-ag double hexamers prefer to bind to pentanucleotides 1 and 3. Collectively, these experiments demonstrate that only two of the four pentanucleotides in the core origin are necessary for T-ag assembly and the induction of structural changes in the core origin. Since all four pentanucleotides in the wild-type origin are necessary for extensive DNA unwinding, we concluded that the second pair of pentanucleotides is required at a step subsequent to the initial assembly process.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
We thank J. Borowiec and D. Simmons for advice on the KMnO4 assays and X. Luo and Li Wang for help with computer modeling.
This work was supported by a grant from the NIH (9RO1GM55397).