| Description |
The current hypothesis in the lab to explain the above observations maintains a requirement for a functional SV40 origin of replication and a functional T antigen in order for spontaneous DNA rearrangement to occur after integration. One of the working models for the mechanism of this T-antigen and origin mediated rearrangement is an "onion skin" replication-type situation. In this model, replication would actually begin to initiate off of the integrated SV40 origin with a Tantigen mediated unwinding of the origin DNA, but at the point of elongation, replication is halted because T-antigen is unable to bind to the nonpermissive mouse cell polymerase. At this point, whatever replication products have been made would be resolved through duplication or deletion as described for the amplification-controlled rearrangement model. |
