BIOL 215 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Hydrophile, Alexander Oparin, Maltose
Document Summary
Dna, rna and proteins: how did the abiotic molecules form these, 3 fundamental classes of molecules associated w/ life (can"t have life without them, replication/transcription/translation. Simple organic molecules produced on earth (or delivered from space) were subsequently linked together into large macromolecules that had some properties of life. Central dogma: dna replicates itself, transcription into mrna, translated into proteins, now turned over, you need proteins/ribosymes to move transcription/trnaslation. Rna world: thomas cech sydney altman discovered first known ribozymes, enzymes made of rna - are cut and join pre-existing rna, evidence that rna could be enzyme/could replicate. Rna -> protein and dna: rna may have eventually begun encoding proteins w/ catalytic properties, dna better suited for information storage. (more chemically stable = can hold larger i. e. reverse transcriptase, which copies rna into dna genomes. Genetic code: universal - specifies same 20 amino acids in all organisms (w/ only few exceptions, this could all happen outside the organisms.