Exo-Taq-Based Detection of DNA-Binding Protein for Homogeneous and Microarray Format

The study of DNA-protein interactions is of great importance to understand basic cellular processes such as transcription, replication and recombination. In this research, we developed a novel detection system for DNA-binding proteins (DBPs) involving the exonuclease (Exo) III and Taq DNA polymerase reactions. The system consists of three steps, as follows: the target DBP in the sample solution is incubated with probe DNA, and the probe is digested with Exo III and then extended with Taq using fluorescent dye-labeled dUTP as a substrate. The DBP protects the probe from digestion by Exo III. Therefore, only the DBP-bound probe allows the following extension. We examined this system using the [lambda] phage Cro repressor in a homogeneous format. The fluorescence image after gel electrophoresis showed a specific band. We also found that this system could be applied to the rapid and efficient detection of DBPs in stem and loop ds-DNA array formats. These results suggest that our method is useful as a new tool for analyzing DNA-protein interactions.