5-Methylcytosine content and methylation status in six millet DNAs.

ABSTRACT

High performance liquid chromatographic analysis of the total nuclear DNAs of 6 millets plant species indicates that the 5-methylcytosine content ranges from 3% in barn yard millet to 9·6% in great millet while the fraction of cytosines methylated varies between 14% in little millet to 31 % in pearl millet. Digestion of millet DNAs with MspI/HpaII suggests that CpG methylation is more in great millet DNA while CpC methylation is more in the other 5 millet DNAs. Digestion of millet DNAs with MboI, Sau3AI and DpnI indicates that some of the 5’ GATC3’ sequences are methylated at adenine and/or cytosine residues except in little millet where adenine methylation of the 5’GATC3’ sequences is insignificant and there is a predominance of cytosine methylation in these sequences.