  It is generally difficult to predict the positions of mutations in genomic
DNA at the nucleotide level. Retroviral DNA insertion is one mode of mutation,
resulting in host infections that are difficult to treat. This mutation process
involves the integration of retroviral DNA into the host-infected cellular
genomic DNA following the interaction between host DNA and a pre-integration
complex consisting of retroviral DNA and integrase. Here, we report that
retroviral insertion sites around a hotspot within the Zfp521 and N-myc genes
can be predicted by a periodic function that is deduced using the diffraction
lattice model. In conclusion, the mutagenesis process is described by a
biophysical model for DNA-DNA interactions.
