A GENETIC ASSAY FOR MRNA'S OF PHAGE T4*
Abstract
A method has been developed by which many gene-specific mRNA's in T4-infected cells can be quantitatively assayed. The method involves separation of complementary strands of phage T4 DNA, hybridization of the strands with RNA, digestion of nonhybridized regions of DNA with an endonuclease specific for single-stranded DNA, and assay of protected genetic markers by transformation. It has been shown that the gene γIIB is transcribed early from the light strand and that the gene 21 is transcribed late from the heavy strand.
Footnotes
-
↵ * This work was supported in part by USPHS research grants GM13511 and AIO5103, and by NSF research grant GB5923. E. G. is an NIH Career Development Awardee (no. GM7567). R. J. is a recipient of a Fulbright travel grant. We thank Dr. Moselio Schaechter for his interest and encouragement and Dr. A. Guha for supplying us with some T4 DNA strands during the early stages of the work.
