ParB binds preferentially to <i>parS in vitro</i>.

<p>(<b>A</b>) Agarose EMSA on after incubating different amounts of ParB with a ³²P-labeled 3120 bp DNA fragment containing the <i>parS</i>-cluster, (<b>B</b>) or with a 3005 bp DNA containing the Mx8 phage <i>attP</i> sequence. (<b>C</b>) Agarose EMSA of the binding of ³²P-labeled <i>parS</i>-cluster to ParB, or to ParB previously incubated with higher amounts of unlabeled <i>attP</i> DNA fragment, as indicated. (<b>D</b>) Agarose EMSA of the binding of ³²P-labeled <i>attP</i> fragment to ParB, or to ParB previously incubated with higher amounts of unlabeled <i>parS</i>-cluster, as indicated. (<b>E</b>) EMSA using a 6% polyacrylamide gel after incubating a ³²P-labeled 50 bp DNA fragment containing the <i>M. xanthus parS</i> consensus sequence with increasing amounts of ParB, as indicated (<b>F</b>) or with this ³²P-labeled 50 bp DNA fragment containing 11 point mutations of the most conserved base pairs of <i>parS</i>.