BISC 160 Chapter Notes - Chapter 4: Hadean, Cell Nucleus, Adenine
23 Aug 2013
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Document Summary
Nucleic acids are polymers specialized for the storage, transmission between generations, and use of genetic information. Dna is a macromolecules that encodes hereditary information. Rna is an intermediate that is used to specify the amino acid sequences of proteins. Nucleotides are the building blocks of nucleic acids: nucleotides consist of a pentose sugar, a phosphate group, and a nitrogen-base. Nitrogen base can be a six-membered single-ring pyrimidine, or a fused double-ring structure called a purine. Ribose differs from deoxyribose in that it has one less oxygen atom: the backbone of rna and dna consists of altering pentose sugars and phosphate groups, nucleotides are joined by phosphodiester linkages. Between the sugar of one nucleotide and the phosphate of the next. Base pairing occurs in both dna and rna: adenine and guanine are purines, thymine and cytosine are pyrimidines, rna contains uracil instead of thymine, three factors make base pairing complementary: The sites for hydrogen bonding on each base.
