Nucleic acid similarities among Pseudomonas pseudomallei, Pseudomonas multivorans, and Actinobacillus mallei

Annealing experiments on membrane filters were carried out with deoxyribonucleic acids (DNA) from selected strains of the nomen-species of Pseudomonas, Actinobacillus, Chromobacterium, and Micrococcus, with the use of DNA of Pseudomonas pseudomallei and Actinobacillus mallei as reference materials. Under the usual conditions employed in these experiments, the results were not quantitatively reproducible. Incorporation of dimethylsulfoxide (DMSO) into the incubation medium greatly increased differences in comparative binding. DNA binding in agar matrices was examined in the presence and absence of DMSO at various incubation temperatures. It was found that the greatest specificity, stability, and total binding for DNA containing high amounts of guanine and cytosine occurred in the presence of DMSO. Under the most stringent annealing conditions permitted in agar, DNA species from P. pseudomallei and A. mallei in the presence of DMSO demonstrated interspecific relative bindings of 76 to 86% when compared to the homologous reactions. The thermal elution midpoints (E-m) of these duplexed interspecific DNA species were quite close to the homologous E-m values. The relative bindings of P. multivorans DNA types to either reference DNA ranged between 6 to 27%, and the E-m values were 4 to 7 C less than those for the homologous reactions.