Deoxyribonucleic Acid, Hydrolysate

Trifluoroacetales have been employed for the mass spec-trometric analysis of nucleosides and hydrolysates of deoxyribonucleic acid [139], but TMS derivatives are... 

The nucleic acids were discovered by Miescher in 1868-1869, when he isolated from pus cell nuclei a material which contained phosphorus, was soluble in alkali, but precipitated under acidic conditions. This material was subsequently prepared from other sources and when freed from protein it was called nucleic acid, a term introduced by Altman in 1889. The classical preparations of nucleic acid from yeast yielded a product which we now recognize as ribonucleic acid (RNA). The nucleic acid prepared from thymus glands, thymonucleic acid, was also extensively studied this material [which, in present terms, was deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA)) was different from yeast nucleic acid. From hydrolysates of these preparations the heterocyclic bases were isolated and characterized. At one time, yeast and thymus nucleic acids were thought to be representative of plant and animal nucleic acids, respectively (3). By 1909, it was apparent that yeast nucleic acid contained adenine, guanine, cytosine, uracil, phosphoric acid, and a sugar which Levene showed at that time to be D-ribose. Thymonucleic acid yielded adenine, guanine, cytosine, thymine, phosphoric acid, and a sugar which was not identified correctly until 1929, when it was characterized as 2-deoxy-D-ribose. 

Procedure A solution of 50—500 (xg nucleic acid in 1 ml water is heated 10 min at 100° C with 2 ml of a solution of 1 g diphenylamine and 2.75 ml cone, sulphuric acid in 100 ml acetic acid. The solution turns blue (abs. max. 595 nm) if deoxyribonucleic acid is present. The difficultly hydrolysable pyrimidine-deoxyribonucleosides and -nucleotides do not react under these conditions. 

Ribonucleases (RNases) are enzymes that specifically hydrolyse the phosphodiester bonds in ribonucleic acid (RNA). They are distinct from general nucleases which digest both RNA and deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), from deoxyribonucleases (DNases) which digest exclusively DNA, and from phosphodiesterases... 

---