A solid-state dedicated circular dichroism (CD) spectrophotometer (J-800KCM) was designed and constructed. As a CD spectrophotometer is a polarization–modulation instrument, CD spectra are necessarily accompanied by artifacts due to macroscopic anisotropies such as linear birefringence (LB) and linear dichroism (LD) which are unique to the solid state. A photomultiplier with the least polarization characteristics and a photoelastic modulator (PEM) with the least residual static birefringence were selected for the new instrument, which was based on the electrical and optical systems of a commercially available spectrophotometer. A phased-locked loop circuit was introduced to a PEM driver, and a sample rotation holder, a stage controller, and an analyzer were installed. We have designed and built a special solid-state sample holder to enable the cancellation of artifact CD, and a lens unit for smaller samples. A set of procedures for obtaining true CD has been devised based on the Mueller matrix method, and a program was written to facilitate the otherwise cumbersome measurements. Using the J-800KCM instrument and this approach, we could obtain nearly zero CD for achiral polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) film dyed with achiral Congo Red by cancelling the substantial apparent CD arising from large macroscopic anisotropies. Experiments on chiral single crystals of $\mathrm{\alpha -}{\mathrm{Ni(H}}_{\mathrm{2}}{\mathrm{O)}}_6\cdot {\mathrm{SO}}_{\mathrm{4}},$ one with larger and one with smaller LB, have established that, by our method, we could also eliminate parasitic artifacts to obtain the true CD.

Nalidixic acid, enoxacin, and other antibacterial 4-quinolones inhibit DNA gyrase activity by interrupting DNA breakage and reunion by A subunits of the A2B2 gyrase complex. Despite their clinical importance, the mode of quinolone action and mechanisms of resistance are poorly understood at the molecular level. Using a DNA fragment enrichment procedure, we isolated the gyrA gene from a uropathogenic Escherichia coli strain that encodes a gyrase A protein cross-resistant to a variety of quinolones. When complemented with gyrase B subunit, the purified A protein reconstituted DNA supercoiling activity approximately 100-fold more resistant to inhibition by enoxacin than the susceptible enzyme and failed to mediate quinolone-dependent DNA cleavage. Nucleotide sequence analysis revealed that the gene differed at 58 nucleotide positions compared with the K-12 gyrA sequence. The 875-amino-acid residue-resistant gyrase A protein differed at three positions from its wild-type E. coli K-12 counterpart: tryptophan, glutamate, and serine replaced serine, aspartate, and alanine residues at positions 83, 678, and 828, respectively. By genetic analysis of chimeric gyrA genes in a gyrA(Ts) background, we showed that the Ser-83----Trp mutation in the gyrase A protein was solely responsible for high-level bacterial resistance to nalidixic acid and fluoroquinolones.