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Updated: May 15, 2026

A High-Throughput Comet Assay Approach for Assessing Cellular DNA Damage
Published on: May 10, 2022
The interaction of cisplatin with a human telomeric DNA sequence containing seventeen tandem repeats
Hanh T Q Nguyen1, Anne M Galea, Vincent Murray
1School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney NSW 2052, Australia.
Abstract:
The anti-tumour drug, cisplatin, preferentially forms adducts at G-rich DNA sequences. Telomeres are found at the ends of chromosomes and, in humans, contain the repeated DNA sequence (GGGTTA)(n) that is expected to be targeted by cisplatin. Using a plasmid clone with 17 tandem telomeric repeats, (GGGTTA)(17), the DNA sequence specificity of cisplatin was investigated utilising the linear amplification procedure that pin-pointed the precise sites of cisplatin adduct formation. This procedure used a fluorescently labelled primer and capillary electrophoresis with laser-induced fluorescence detection to determine the DNA sequence specificity of cisplatin. This technique provided a very accurate analysis of cisplatin-DNA adduct formation in a long telomeric repeat DNA sequence. The DNA sequence specificity of cisplatin in a long telomeric tandem repeat has not been previously reported. The results indicated that the 3'-end of the G-rich strand of the telomeric repeat was preferentially damaged by cisplatin and this suggests that the telomeric DNA repeat has an unusual conformation.
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