Inducing the replacement of PNA in DNA·PNA duplexes by DNA Original Research Article

The uncharged DNA-analogue peptide nucleic acid (PNA) can invade into dsDNA by displacing the non-complementary DNA strand. The formed strand displacement complexes can create a sterical hindrance to block access of enzymes such as nucleases and polymerases. Due to the high stability of DNA·PNA duplexes it is usually not possible to displace the PNA strand by ssDNA or ssRNA. We herein report that the polycationic, comb-type copolymer αPLL-g-Dex can induce such a replacement of PNA in DNA·PNA duplexes by ssDNA. The influence of the copolymer on strand exchange highly depends on the nature of the oligonucleotides. Acceleration has only been observed when both the starting duplex and the single-stranded exchanger strand were negatively charged. The presented approach should allow the withdrawal of PNA induced sterical hindrance of DNA by rehybridisation with ssDNA.