Fabrication of duplex DNA microarrays incorporating methyl-5-cytosine

We synthesized customized double-stranded DNA microarrays including methyl-5-cytosine at CpG dinucleotides and produced all 163,555 possible 8-mers (un-, hemi-, and di-methylated) to gain insight into how methylation affects transcription factor binding. An antibody to methyl-5-cytidine showed greater binding to the methylated DNA, demonstrating efficient incorporation of methyl-5-cytosine into the synthesized DNA. In contrast, binding of the transcription factor CREB was inhibited by CpG methylation. This platform represents a powerful new technology to evaluate the effect of DNA methylation on protein binding in any sequence context.