Effect of macromolecular crowding in DNA folding

Abstract

The effect of macromolecular crowding has already been studied in protein folding, but there are almost no precedents about its impact on the DNA folding. In this work, we have studied the folding of a DNA hairpin in the presence of different concentrations of PEG as a crowder agent using optical tweezers. The obtained results suggest that macromolecular crowding impacts in the studied DNA hairpin folding/unfolding process by varying its folding free energy and its coexistence force, becoming a more stable structure. Nevertheless, further studies are required to collect more data and explore other conditions to infer consistent conclusions on this topic