Recent advances in FRET: distance determination in protein-DNA complexes

Fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET) provides information on the d istance between a donor and an acceptor dye in the range 10 to 100 Angstrom . Knowledge of the exact positions of some dyes with respect to nucleic aci ds now enables us to translate these data into precise structural informati on using molecular modeling. Advances in the preparation of dye-labeled nuc leic acid molecules and in new techniques, such as the measurement of FRET in polyacrylamide gels or in vivo, will lead to an increasingly important r ole of FRET in structural and molecular biology.