Physico-chemical and biological properties of antisense phosphodiester oligonucleotides with various secondary structures

The influence of the secondary structure of oligonucleotides having a natur al phosphodiester backbone on their ability to interact with DNA and RNA ta rgets and on their resistance to the nucleolytic digestion is investigated. Oligonucleotides having hairpin, looped and snail-like structure are found to be much more stable to nuclease degradation in different biological med ia and inside cells than the linear ones. The structured oligonucleotides c an also hybridise with their DNA and RNA targets.