Nucleobases and DNA react non-enzymatically with sugars, and generate DNA-advanced glycation end products (DNA-AGEs). Incubation of plasmid pBr322 with ribose for 3-7 days caused the transformation of the supercoiled plasmid to the open circular and linear forms. Removal of sugar after an initial 24 h incubation resulted in marked enhancement in the transformation rate. Enhancement in transformation was also observed when bovine serum albumin (BSA) exposed to ribose for short durations was incubated with plasmid in absence of the sugar. The effect on DNA was attenuated when excess ribose remained in the incubation mixture of ribose and protein. The data suggested that an increase in ribose concentration in the vicinity of DNA could be damaging and the damage exacerbated, if sugar levels fell subsequently. Incubation of herring sperm DNA with ribose resulted in a concentration and time-dependent increase of N2-carboxyethyl-2'-deoxyguanosine (CEdGA,B). The concentration of CEdGA,B, however, did not increase further when ribose was removed from the reaction mixture.