The answer to your question is yes. W. Curtis Johnson wrote a beautiful article, "Determination of the Conformation of Nucleic Acids by Electronic CD", as chapter 12 in the text "Circular Dichroism and the Conformational Analysis of Biomolecules" by Fasman. He explains in great detail how the CD signature in nucleic acids arise. I highly recommend you read this article.

Best regards

The answer to your question is yes. W. Curtis Johnson wrote a beautiful article, "Determination of the Conformation of Nucleic Acids by Electronic CD", as chapter 12 in the text "Circular Dichroism and the Conformational Analysis of Biomolecules" by Fasman. He explains in great detail how the CD signature in nucleic acids arise. I highly recommend you read this article.

Best regards

A group from Brno in the Czech Republic (Kypr et al.) published a nice review in Nucleic Acids Research just a few years ago detailing CD signatures for left- and right-handed duplex DNA as well as quadruplex structures and other structures that can be induced by specific solutes. The reference is:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2665218/pdf/gkp026.pdf

I would have suggested the Ch 12 by W. Curtis Johnson already cited by J.Hansen, as a good starting point.

Yes, but if all you want to is identify ss and ds DNA, it's far simpler to run a gel. Or do you want to study their structures? or do you want to deconvolute the Cd spectrum of a mixture? That is far more difficult.

I read that the achiral dye DiSC 2(5) (3-3'diethylthiadicarbocyanine) gives an intense induced CD signal when bound to DNA-PNA duplexes, but not when bound to the respective single chains (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16170795). I wonder if the same happen for DNA-DNA duplexes. This could be an easy way to see if you have ds or ss DNA. Hope it helps

In my opinion, a commercial kit, such as picogreen assay kit (for dsDNA) and oligreen assay kit (for ssDNA), is a more reliable method for DNA quantification. From my experience, most times spectroscopy doesn't give me the predictable results. Hope it helps.

To put it simply - NO

you can generate and isolate dsDNA and ssDNA using M13 phage in E.coli and test the 2 types of DNA and compare each other and them apply to you sample....but using the sugestion of @Katerina Kontanikola you will get a fast and more accurate result.

In my opinion, the best way is running a gel to identify ss and ds DNA .

if the objective is only to identify single or double stranded DNA then as suggested running agarose gel is sufficient. Else you can also use single strand specific nuclease.

There are easier ways in addition to CD spectroscopy. The simplest- take your sample of DNA, quantify it by UV, divide in half, denature one half (90C for 5 min, ice 5 min) and run along with known double stranded and single-stranded DNA controls of similar concentration on a simple agarose gel, stained with etidium bromide. If denatured sample shows any difference from original sample (size, staining intensity), it was double-stranded or partially double stranded. Good luck.

Anastasia, are you sure that all that is easier than running a CD spectrum? XD

Hi Arun¡ This is a commercial Kit. I don't have personal experience.

Trevigen γ-H2AX ELISA Kit:

-validated

-quantitative

-easy to use

-sensitive

-excellent reproducibility

if your objective is only to identify single or double stranded DNA then as suggested running agarose gel is sufficient.

Hi Arun

I am a big fan of CD-Spectroscopy, unfortunately you don't have so much photometers available, so the examples might be rare; I would suggest from your question that you that you have acces to one.

There are a few quick and easy labmethods for purities of DNA/RNA containing mixtures, a few mentioned in the answers.

Here is a brief example for a standard purity estimation.:

http://people.rit.edu/~rhrsbi/GEPages/LabManualPDF5ed/09%20UV%20Absorption.pdf

I can imagine that the CD spectras might give a possibility, usually Fluorescence Spectroscopy with intercallating dyes is a good option to examin basic strucutral differences too.

I don't know whose blog I have stumbled across, but if any of you think you can definitively distinguish between ss and ds DNA in your own labs, and if you wish to be involved in a very important experiment, I can supply the experiment.  In about 10 minutes of work, I can non-destructively separate the strands of a circular plasmid, which would prove that the strands do NOT have the WC twisted ('plectonemic') structure.  But I have no lab facilities within which I can prove that the products are really intact, ss circular DNA.  Don't think 'that's impossible - the WC structure is totally proven'.  It's NOT proven.  A brilliant researcher named Tai Te Wu separated the strands of 2 different plasmids in 1996, and proved unequivocally that they were still intact (Wu R & Wu TT, 1996, Bull Math Biol, 58, 1171-1185, DOI:10.1007/BF02458388).  The Wu experiment is too long, complex and expensive to repeat.  I have figured out how to repeat it in about 10 minutes, at a cost of ~$0, but I need help characterizing the product.  If you're interested contact me at [email protected].  For more info, see my web site, https://notahelix.net.  This site has more info on this subject than you'd care to read.