Intracellular DNA-protein complexes from bacteriophage T4-infected cells isolated by a rapid two-step procedure. Characterization and identification of the protein components.

A simple technique has been developed for isolating intracellular DNA and its bound proteins from uninfected and phage-infected bacteria. This technique, which utilizes aqueous salt concentrations in the physiological range, is based upon the fact that DNA exists in normal cell lysates in a stiff random coil conformation, and has an unusually large excluded volume to mass ratio. Such stiff coils display a unique combination of low sedimentation coefficient and large Stokes radius, enabling them to be separated rapidly from all other cellular components by successive centrifugal and gel permeation steps. Analysis of this purified intracellular DNA fraction from bacteriophage T4-infected Escherichia coli reveals mainly DNA and protein, with a small amount of RNA also present. Among the major proteins obtained are the DNA-dependent RNA polymerase of the host and the products of T4 genes rIIA, rIIB, and 32 (DNA-"unwinding" protein). Small amounts of the proteins coded by T4 genes 43 (DNA polymerase) and 42 (dCMP hydroxymethylase) have also been identified, in addition to at least 13 other phage-coded proteins of unidentified genes. Much of the phage-coded protein in the complex, including the gene 32 protein, does not exchange readily with the same protein exogenously added in the lysate.