The fluorescence lifetimes of parinaric acid (PnA) isomers have been measured in pure solvents and in synthetic phospholipid membranes over a wide temperature range. In pure solvents, dodecane, ethanol, and cyclohexanol, the emission is well described by three exponential components of approximately 40, 12, and 2 ns. The preexponential factor of the long-lifetime component is quite small, and t...

The location of peanut agglutinin (PNA) binding was investigated in the segmental ganglia of the developing grasshopper embryo. Neuronal processes were stained but cell bodies were not. The first appearance of PNA binding in development was associated with the first neurons to initiate axon outgrowth, the progeny of the MP2 cells. In the early stages of development the location of PNA binding w...

We tried to reproduce some basic implications of the Hodgkin-Huxley-Frankenhaeuser formalism by measuring sodium currents in single myelinated nerve fibres with a commercially available version of the potential clamp device according to Nonner. The following contradictory observations were made: 1. The potential dependence of the time to peak sodium currents showed a discontinuity around the so...

Because peptide nucleic acids (PNAs) are poorly taken up by mammalian cells, strategies need to be developed for their intracellular delivery. In the present study, we demonstrated the possibility to efficiently release a naked PNA targeting the catalytic component of human telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT-PNA) into the cytoplasm of DU145 prostate cancer cells through the photochemical i...

PNA probes for the specific detection of DNA from olive oil samples by microarray technology were developed. The presence of as low as 5% refined hazelnut (Corylus avellana) oil in extra-virgin olive oil (Olea europaea L.) could be detected by using a PNA microarray. A set of two single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) from the Actin gene of Olive was chosen as a model for evaluating the ability...

An immobilized amino acid napbthylamide substrate for proteinases with tryptic-like specificity was prepared by reacting L-arginine P-naphthylamide with an N-hydroxysuccinimide-activated derivative of agarose. Hydrolysis of the immobilized substrate (AlO-Arg-PNA) was followed by monitoring the increase in fluorescence accompanying the release of /3-naphthylamine. Assays using AIO-Arg-PNA were d...

We describe the first Gquadruplex targeting approach that combines an intercalation and a hybridization strategy by investigating the interaction of a G-rich PNA acridone conjugate 1 with a three repeat fragment of the human telomere G3 to form a hybrid PNA-DNA quadruplex mimicking the biologically relevant (3+1) pure DNA dimeric telomeric quadruplex. Using a combination of UV, CD and fluoresce...

Peptide Nucleic Acids (PNAs) are single-stranded synthetic nucleic acids with a pseudopeptide backbone in lieu of the phosphodiester linked sugar and phosphate found in traditional oligos. PNA designed complementary to the bacterial Shine-Dalgarno or start codon regions of mRNA disrupts translation resulting in the transient reduction in protein expression. This study examines the use of PNA te...