Quantitative aspects of the binding of nuclear non-histone proteins to DNA as determined by centrifugation in metrizamide gradients

Density-gradient centrifugation in metrizamide gradients has been used to study the binding of nuclear proteins to DNA. The unique advantage of this method is that the nucleoprotein complexes can be isolated free of non-complexed DNA and proteins. The chromatin non-histone proteins bound to native DNA in a non-random manner. The extent of binding was dependent on the ionic strength of the medium and was decreased in the presence of RNA.