MCB 2210 Lecture Notes - Lecture 27: Telomerase Reverse Transcriptase, Tandemly Arrayed Genes, Telomerase
17 Dec 2018
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Document Summary
Old cells have different characteristics than young ones. Cell death plays a crucial role in animal development, function of the immune system, and prevention of cancer. Necrosis - premature death due to infection or injury, elicits immune response. Apoptosis - programmed cell death (cell suicide) Phagocytosis - involves a cell (a phagocyte like macrophage) eating" a dying cell (apoptotic or infected cell) Telomerase - reverse transcriptase enzyme complex that maintains a 3-20kb of dna repeats at the ends of chromosomes, overcoming the end replication problem during. Telomeres - physical ends of linear chromosomes that consist of tandem arrays of the. Germ line, embryonic and stem cells undergo many cell divisions and produce high levels of telomerase. Somatic cells produce low levels of telomerase. Rates of division along with oxidative damage appear to outpace the telomerase activity and telomeres shorten over time, a sign of cell aging.
