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A stable double-stranded DNA-ethidium homodimer complex: application to picogram fluorescence detection of DNA in agarose gels.

The complex between double-stranded DNA and ethidium homodimer (5,5'-diazadecamethylene)bis(3,8-diamino-6-phenylphenanthridini um) cation, formed at a ratio of 1 homodimer per 4 or 5 base pairs, is stable in agarose gels under the usual conditions for electrophoresis. This unusual stability allows formation of the complex before electrophoresis and then separation and detection in the absence of background stain. Competition experiments between the preformed DNA-ethidium homodimer complex and a 50-fold molar excess of unlabeled DNA show that approximately one-third of the dye is retained within the original complex independent of the duration of the competition. However, dye-extraction experiments show that these are not covalent complexes. After electrophoretic separation, detection of bands containing 25 pg of DNA was readily achieved in 1-mm thick agarose gels with laser excitation at 488 nm and a scanning confocal fluorescence imaging system. The band intensity was linear with the amount of DNA applied from 0.2 to 1.0 ng per lane and with the number of kilobase pairs (kbp) per band within a lane. Analysis of an aliquot of a polymerase-chain-reaction mixture permitted ready detection of 80 pg of a 1.6-kbp amplified fragment. The use of the ethidium homodimer complex together with laser excitation for DNA detection on gels is at least two orders of magnitude more sensitive than conventional fluorescence-based procedures. The homodimer-DNA complex exemplifies a class of fluorescent probes where the intercalation of dye chromophores in DNA forms a stable, highly fluorescent ensemble.