Inhibitor studies of phage T4 wild-type and mutant DNA polymerases. III. Distamycin A, actinomycin D, adriamycin, daunomycin and ethidium.

Adriamycin, daunomycin and ethidium, intercalating drugs which bind to double- as well as single-stranded DNA, inhibit phage T4 antimutator mutant CB121 DNA polymerase more strongly than the T4 wild-type and the mutator L98 polymerase. In contrast, all three enzymes are inhibited equally by distamycin A and actinomycin C. The latter two inhibitors bind only to double-stranded DNA.