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Updated: Aug 29, 2026

Structure and Coordination Determination of Peptide-metal Complexes Using 1D and 2D 1H NMR
Published on: December 16, 2013
A second-generation copper(II)-mediated metallo-DNA-base pair
Nicole Zimmermann1, Eric Meggers, Peter G Schultz
1Department of Chemistry, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA.
Abstract:
Metal-dependent pairing of nucleobases represents an alternative DNA base pairing scheme. Our first-generation copper(II)-mediated pyridine-2,6-dicarboxylate (Dipic) and pyridine (Py) metallo-base pair has a stability comparable to the natural base pairs dA:dT and dC:dG but does not have the selectivity of the Watson Crick base pairs. In order to increase the selectivity of base pair formation, a second-generation metallo-base pair was generated consisting of a pyridine-2,6-dicarboxamide (Dipam) and a pyridine (Py) nucleobase. This new metallo-base pair is more stable than the natural base pairs dA:dT and dC:dG and highly selective against mispairing. In addition, incorporation of multiple metallo-base pairs into DNA results in the formation of stable duplexes demonstrating that hydrogen bonding base pairs can efficiently be replaced by metal-dependent base pairs at multiple sites in DNA.
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