Papers › High nucleotide skew palindromic DNA sequences function as replication origins due to...

High nucleotide skew palindromic DNA sequences function as replication origins due to their unzipping propensity

18 Jul 2024arXiv:2407.13260archive 2025-07-28

Parthasarathi Sahu, Sashikanta Barik, Koushik Ghosh, Hemachander Subramanian

Locations of DNA replication initiation in prokaryotes, called "origins of replication", are well-characterized. However, a mechanistic understanding of the sequence-dependence of the local unzipping of double-stranded DNA, the first step towards replication initiation, is lacking. Here, utilizing a Markov chain model that was created to address the directional nature of DNA unzipping and replication, we model the sequence dependence of local melting of double-stranded linear DNA segments. We show that generalized palindromic sequences with high nucleotide skews have a low kinetic barrier for local melting near melting temperatures. This allows for such sequences to function as replication origins. We support our claim with evidence for high-skew palindromic sequences within the replication origins of mitochondrial DNA, bacteria, archaea and plasmids.

PaperPDFCode

Code

parthatbio/unzippingdna officialmentioned in paper report

Repository list and official/mentioned flags are the archive's, frozen 2025-07-28. Reachability, where shown, is from one Syntology probe window (2026-09-16 to 2026-09-18); repositories not probed show nothing. GitHub stars are not tracked.

Code Syntology ran Syntology

Not run by Syntology. Nothing on this page verifies that the listed code works.

Results from the paper archive 2025-07-28

No leaderboard rows for this paper in the archive.

Report a problem or propose a change · a person checks every report against the paper or source before anything changes; decisions are listed on /corrections