difference between sticky ends and blunt ends

Answer 1

Sticky ends and blunt ends are two different types of DNA ends that are produced by restriction enzymes.

1. Sticky ends:
Sticky ends are generated when a restriction enzyme cuts DNA in a staggered fashion. It cleaves the double-stranded DNA at specific sequences, leaving overhanging single-stranded tails at each end. These tails called sticky ends can stick to other complementary single-stranded tails that have been produced by the same restriction enzyme, which makes it possible to join two DNA fragments together. In other words, the sticky ends allow for ligation to occur easily and efficiently.

2. Blunt ends:
Blunt ends are generated when a restriction enzyme cuts DNA straight across, leaving no overhanging tail. This creates two flat ends that can be ligated together. However, blunted ended fragments are difficult to ligate without additional measures, such as adding a short complementary sequence or using DNA ligases that are specifically designed to ligate blunt ended fragments. The blunt ends are less efficient in ligation and generally require more effort to join two fragments.

Overall, the main difference between sticky ends and blunt ends is that sticky ends have overhanging single-stranded tails that are complementary to each other and can easily be ligated together, while blunt ends do not have any overhanging tails which makes ligation more challenging.