Cleavage of DNA in nuclei and chromatin with staphylococcal nuclease

Treatment of either rat liver chromatin or intact nuclei with the enzyme staphylococcal nuclease results in the conversion of about half of the DNA to acid-soluble oligonucleotides. As previously described, mild digestion of nuclei results in the liberation of a series of nucleoprotein particles containing DNA fragments which are all integral multiples of a unit length DNA 185 base pairs in length. Analysis of the kinetics of appearance of these fragments suggests that at least 85% of the nuclear DNA is involved in the formation of the repeating subunit profile. More extensive digestion of nuclei however results in the generation of a series of eight unique DNA fragments containing 160 to 50 base pairs. The series of smaller molecular weight DNA is virtually identical with the profile obtained upon limit digestion of isolated chromatin. By velocity centrifugation we have obtained highly purified preparations of the monomeric nucleoprotein particle. Digestion of this monomeric subunit results in the solubilization of 46% of the DNA and analysis of the resistant DNA again reveals the set of eight lower molecular weight fragments. These data suggest that the initial site of nuclease cleavage in chromatin resides within the DNA bridging the repeating monomeric subunits. Further attack results in cleavage at a set of sites within the monomer liberating a pattern of smaller DNA fragments which probably represents the points of intimate contact between the histones and DNA.