Synthesis and base pairing properties of DNA-RNA heteroduplex containing 5-hydroxyuridine

5-Hydroxyuridine (5-OHU) is a major lesion of uridine and cytosine produced in RNA by various chemical oxidants. To elucidate its biochemical and biophysical effects on RNA replication, the site-specifically modified oligoribonucleotides containing 5-OHU were synthesized with C5-hydroxy-5'-ODMTr-2'-TBDMS-uridine phosphoramidite using automated solid phase synthesis. The base-pairing properties of nucleotides opposite 5-OHU in 24 mer oligoribonulcleotides with dNTP were studied using three reverse transcriptases (Super-Script^TMII-, AMV-, MMLV-RT) in cDNA synthesis. Adenine as well as guanine was incorporated preferentially by all reverse transcriptases. In the UV-melting temperature experiment, the results from the relative stabilities of the base pairs were A: 5-OHU > G: 5-OHU > T: 5-OHU ≈ C: 5-OHU. Circular Dichroism (CD) studies showed that DNA-RNA containing 5-OHU heteroduplexes exhibit a similar conformation between the A-type RNA and B-type DNA. These results suggest that 5-OHU from oxidative damage was mainly influenced by adenine mismatch.