Nonhistone proteins HMG1 and HMG2 suppress the nucleosome assembly at physiological ionic strength.

The effect of nonhistone protein HMG1 and HMG2 from pig thymus on the in vitro nucleosome assembly has been examined with plasmid pSV2-gpt DNA and pig thymus core histones in the presence of DNA topoisomerase I. In the absence of core histones, the direct binding of HMG proteins could induce negative superhelical turns in DNA at low ionic strength, but not at physiological ionic strength. The nucleosome formation in the higher histone-to-DNA ratios at physiological ionic strength was not facilitated by HMG proteins, in contrast to poly(L-glutamic acid). HMG proteins suppressed the nucleosome assembly in the moderate histone-to-DNA ratios, resulting in the reduction of fully supercoiled DNA topoisomers. The suppression by HMG proteins was not cancelled by poly(L-glutamic acid). These suggest that the highly acidic carboxy terminal of HMG proteins does not act as an assembly factor, and that the HMG proteins, on the contrary, suppress the nucleosome formation, probably by binding to DNA in a way to inhibit the assembly into core particles.