Structural repeat units of Chinese hamster ovary chromatin. Evidence for variations in repeat unit ONA size in higher eukaryotes.

DNA lengths in the structural repeat units of Chinese ham-ster ovary (CHO) and chicken erythrocyte chromatin were compared by analyzing the sizes of DNA fragments produced after treatment of nuclei with staphylococcal nuclease. The repeat length of CHO chromatin (173 ± 4 BP) is about 20 base pairs (BP) smaller than that of chicken erythrocyte chromatin (194 ± 8 BP). Repeat lengths of rat liver and calf thymus chromatin were found to be about 10 BP shorter than that of chicken erythrocyte chromatin. Thus significant variations occur in repeat units of chroraatin of higher eukaryotes. These variations occur in the lengths of "spacer " (or "internucleosomal") DNA segments, not in "core particle " (or "nucleosomal") DNA lengths. The concept of spacer regions and the possible influence of HI histones is discussed