THE NATURE OF THE INTERACTION OF NUCLEIC ACIDS AND NUCLEI WITH BASIC DYESTUFFS

Abstract

Since Paul Ehrlich's research in the field of histological staining methods sixty years ago, it has been known that cellular nuclei can be stained with basic dyestuffs. This property of the nucleus was always recognized as due to its content of nucleic acid. In this paper it will be shown that the particular manner in which basic dyes are adsorbed by nuclei or by solutions of nucleic acids is something quite specific, and different from the manner in which such dyes are adsorbed by other stainable substrates that may occur to biologists in the widest sense. An attempt will be made also to correlate this property of nucleic acids with their structural configuration.