| abstract |
A novel class of compounds, exemplified by oligomers comprised of purine, pyrimidine, and other nucleobase monomers are disclosed. The nucleobase oligomers hydrogen bond through Watson/Crick base pairing to complementary nucleic acids, such as DNA and RNA, in an opposing strand. Each internal nucleobases in the oligomer has two attachment sites and is attached to two nucleobases by linkers. Terminating groups may contain reactive functionality, labels, reporters, or nucleic acids. The nucleobase oligomer compounds are useful as sequence specific recognition molecules for complementary nucleic acids. Where the molecule consists of sections of nucleobase oligomer and nucleic acid, the chimera may be an enzyme substrate in cleavage, ligation, and primer extension methods such as PCR and DNA sequencing. |