PEPTIDE NUCLEIC-ACIDS - EXPANDING THE SCOPE OF NUCLEIC-ACID RECOGNITION

Peptide nucleic acids (PNAs) are DNA analogs containing neutral amide backbone linkages, PNAs are stable to degradation by enzymes and hybri dize to complementary sequences with higher affinity than analogous DN A oligomers, PNA synthesis employs protocols derived from solid-phase peptide synthesis, making the methodology straightforward and flexible , PNAs are being incorporated into an expanding set of applications, i ncluding genome mapping, the identification of mutations and measureme nt of telomere length. The growth in the popularity of PNAs as a tool for nucleic acid recognition should accelerate as the properties of PN As become more familiar.