Nonradioactive assay for sequence-specific DNA binding proteins.

A nonradioactive functional assay was developed to quantitate DNA binding proteins. The assay was designed to allow the use of 96-well microplates for high sample throughput. We show that the assay can measure sequence-specific DNA binding of purified proteins as well as DNA binding activity present in whole cell extracts. By using a temperature-sensitive DNA binding protein, we demonstrate that DNA binding as measured by this novel assay correlates with the biological function of the protein.