Method for nucleic acid amplification

1. A method of amplifying at least one target nucleic acid molecule, the method comprising:

a. contacting a sample comprising the at least one target nucleic acid molecule, at least one amplification primer, at least one nucleic acid polymerase comprising 3′-5′ exonuclease activity, and a mixture of nucleotides, wherein the mixture of nucleotides comprises at least one terminator nucleotide which terminates nucleic acid replication by the polymerase, wherein the terminator nucleotide is an irreversible terminator which inhibits 3′-5′ exonuclease activity of the polymerase, and is selected from nucleotides with modification to the alpha group, C3 spacer nucleotides, locked nucleic acids (LNA), inverted nucleic acids, 2′ fluoro nucleotides, 3′ phosphorylated nucleotides, 2′-O-Methyl modified nucleotides, and trans nucleic acids, and

b. amplifying the at least one target nucleic acid molecule to generate a plurality of terminated amplification products, wherein the terminator nucleotide is attached to the 3′ terminus of the terminated amplification products, and wherein the replication proceeds by strand displacement replication.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the nucleic acid polymerase is bacteriophage phi 29 ( 129 ) polymerase, genetically modified phi29 (Φ29) DNA polymerase, phage M2 DNA polymerase, phage phiPRD1 DNA polymerase, Bsu DNA polymerase, a polymerase, a polymerase, DNA polymerase I, T5 DNA polymerase, T7 DNA polymerase, T4 DNA polymerase or thermophilic DNA polymerases.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the amplification primers are 4 to 70 nucleotides in length and the at least one amplification primer comprises a randomized region.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the amplification is performed under conditions wherein the temperature varies by no more than 10 degrees C.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein at least 3% of the terminated amplification products are direct copies of the at least one target nucleic acid molecule.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the ratio of terminated amplification products which are direct copy amplicons to target nucleic acid molecules is at least a 10:1.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the least one terminator nucleotide comprises modifications of the r group of the 3′ carbon of the deoxyribose.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one terminator nucleotide comprises modification to the alpha group.

9. The method of claim 8 , wherein the nucleotides with modification to the alpha group are alpha-thio dideoxynucleotides.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein the terminator nucleotides do not comprise a detectable moiety or tag.

11. The method of claim 1 wherein the terminator nucleotides reduce exonuclease proofreading activity of the at least one nucleic acid polymerase on the terminated amplification products by at least 85%.

12. The method of claim 1 , wherein the mixture of nucleotides further comprises a mixture of nucleotides which are not attached to the polynucleotides, wherein the mixture comprises deoxynucleoside triphosphates and terminator nucleotides in a 1:1 to 1000:1 ratio.

13. The method of claim 1 , wherein the amplification products are between about 50 and about 2000 nucleotides in length.

14. The method of claim 13 , wherein the amplification products are between about 200 and about 1000 nucleotides in length.

15. The method of claim 1 , wherein the method further comprises an additional amplification step using PCR.

16. The method of claim 15 , wherein the method further comprises sequencing.

17. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one amplification primer comprise a barcode.

18. The method of claim 17 , wherein the barcode comprises a cell barcode or a sample barcode.

19. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one target nucleic acid is obtained from a single cell.

20. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one target nucleic acid is obtained from human genomic DNA.