Hydrostatic and osmotic pressure study of the RNA hydration

The tertiary structure of nucleic acids results from an equilibrium between electrostatic interactions of phosphates, stacking interactions of bases, hydrogen bonds between polar atoms and water molecules. Water interactions with ribonucleic acid play a key role in its structure formation, stabilization and dynamics. We used high hydrostatic pressure and osmotic pressure to analyze changes in RNA hydration. We analyzed the lead catalyzed hydrolysis of tRNA(Phe) from S. cerevisiae as well as hydrolytic activity of leadzyme. Pb(II) induced hydrolysis of the single phosphodiester bond in tRNA(Phe) is accompanied by release of 98 water molecules, while other molecule, leadzyme releases 86.