BIO206H5 Chapter Notes - Chapter 2: Dna, Deoxyribose, Pyrimidine
Document Summary
Dna and rna are built from subunits called nucleotides. Nucleosides are made of nitrogen-containing ring compound linked to a five- carbon sugar, which can be either ribose or deoxyribose. Nucleotides are nucleosides that contain one or more phosphate groups attached to the sugar, and they come in two main forms: those containing ribose are known as ribonucleotides and those containing deoxyribose known as deoxyribonucleotides. The nitrogen-containing rings of all these molecules are generally referred to as bases. There is a strong family resemblance between the different nucleotide bases: pyrimidines (derive from a six-membered pyrimidine ring) 2) purines (bear a second, five-membered ring fused to the six-membered ring. Nucleotides have a fundamental role in the storage and retrieval of biological information. There are two main types of nucleic acids, which differ in the type of sugar contained in their sugar-phosphate backbone.
