The last step simply involves reading the gel to determine the sequence of the input DNA.
The last step simply involves reading the gel to determine the sequence of the input DNA. Because DNA polymerase only synthesizes DNA in the 5’ to 3’ direction starting at a provided primer, each terminal ddNTP will correspond to a specific nucleotide in the original sequence (e.g., the shortest fragment must terminate at the first nucleotide from the 5’ end, the second-shortest fragment must terminate at the second nucleotide from the 5’ end, etc.) Therefore, by reading the gel bands from smallest to largest, we can determine the 5’ to 3’ sequence of the original DNA strand.