The rotating frame nuclear Overhauser effect spectroscopy experiment as anaid to determining solution structures of DNA oligomers

Important intrinsic characteristics of the rotating frame nuclear Overhause r effect spectroscopy (ROESY) experiment were found to be advantageous in D NA solution structure determination. In a ROESY experiment, the different m echanisms of relaxation result in different signs of cross peaks, enabling a clear distinction between H2' resonances and H2 " resonances of the DNA s ugar backbone. This method is of particular importance in crowded spectra, for purine resonances whose H2', H2 " protons typically resonate closely, a s well as in conditions where line broadening makes coupling constants in a correlated spectroscopy experiment impossible to determine. By observing t he signs of cross peaks in the base proton to H2', H2 " sugar proton region , the ROESY spectrum can be used to distinguish A-form, B-form, and Z-form DNA. (C) 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Biopoly 54: 35-43, 2000.