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Using single-molecule techniques, Liphardt et al. have analyzed the folding and unfolding reactions of a series of nested RNA molecules. In this Perspective, Fernandez et al. discuss the surprising observation that the smallest of these RNAs, a simple hairpin structure, undergoes an all-or-nothing transition between the folded and the unfolded state, rather than the RNA strands unzipping.
J. M. Fernandez and A. F. Oberhauser are in the Department of Physiology and Biophysics, Mayo Foundation, Rochester, MN 55905, USA. S. Chu is in the Department of Physics, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305-4060, USA.
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In Science Magazine
REPORTS
Jan Liphardt, Bibiana Onoa, Steven B. Smith, Ignacio Tinoco, Jr., and Carlos Bustamante (27 April 2001) Science292 (5517), 733.
[DOI: 10.1126/science.1058498] |Abstract »|Full Text »|PDF »|Supplemental Data »
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