Complex of simian virus large T antigen and p53 can bind DNA specifically.

The DNA-binding activity of p53 was suggested to be abrogated by binding of large T antigen. However we demonstrate that a fraction of p53 can form a complex with large T antigen and still bind DNA specifically. In EMSA analysis, both PAb 416 and 419 anti-large-T antibodies could induce supershift on p53-DNA complex using extracts derived from two T-antigen-transformed cell lines. In EMSA-Western analysis, one of the p53-complexes was shown to contain large T antigen.