Cytogenetics

Group 1: Tan, Nenita Fe

Ardiente, Yvonne Crystal
Jomoc, Kathrina

Nucleic Acids

DNA

Nucleic Acids
o Are large molecules composed of codon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen,
and phosphorous (Tate, 2009)
o Is a polymer in which monomer units are nucleotides. (Stoker, 2012)
Nucleotide is A nucleotide is an organic molecule made up of a nucleotide
base, a five-carbon sugar (ribose or deoxyribose) and at least one phosphate
group. Nucleotides make up the basic units of DNA and RNA molecules.
Functions of Nucleic acids:
o Encodes, transmits, and expresses genetic information.
Pyrimidine derivative a monocyclic base with a six-membered ring.
o Three Pyrimidine derivatives: Thymine (T), Cytosine (C), Uracil (U)
Purine derivative a bicyclic base with fused five- and six-membered rings.
o Two Purine Derivatives: Adenine (A) and Guanine (G)
o Two types of nucleic acids: DNA and RNA

What is DNA?
o the hereditary material in humans and almost all other organisms.
Nearly every cell in a persons body has the same DNA. Most DNA is
located in the cell nucleus (where it is called nuclear DNA), but a
small amount of DNA can also be found in the mitochondria (where it is
called mitochondrial DNA or mtDNA).
The information in DNA is stored as a code made up of four chemical bases:
adenine (A), guanine (G), cytosine (C), and thymine (T). Human DNA
consists of about 3 billion bases, and more than 99 percent of those bases
are the same in all people. The order, or sequence, of these bases determines
the information available for building and maintaining an organism, similar to
the way in which letters of the alphabet appear in a certain order to form
words and sentences.
DNA bases pair up with each other, A with T and C with G, to form units called
base pairs. Each base is also attached to a sugar molecule and a phosphate
molecule. Together, a base, sugar, and phosphate are called a nucleotide.
Nucleotides are arranged in two long strands that form a spiral called a
double helix. The structure of the double helix is somewhat like a ladder,
with the base pairs forming the ladders rungs and the sugar and phosphate
molecules forming the vertical sidepieces of the ladder.
An important property of DNA is that it can replicate, or make copies of itself.
Each strand of DNA in the double helix can serve as a pattern for duplicating

the sequence of bases. This is critical when cells divide because each new
cell needs to have an exact copy of the DNA present in the old cell.
DNA is a long polymer made from repeating units called nucleotides. DNA
was first identified and isolated by Friedrich Miescher and the double helix
structure of DNA was first discovered by James Watson and Francis Crick,
using experimental data collected by Rosalind Franklin and Maurice Wilkins.
In living organisms DNA does not usually exist as a single molecule, but
instead as a pair of molecules that are held tightly together. These two long
strands entwine like vines, in the shape of a double helix. The nucleotide
repeats contain both the segment of the backbone of the molecule, which
holds the chain together, and a nucleobase, which interacts with the other
DNA strand in the helix. A nucleobase linked to a sugar is called a
nucleoside and a base linked to a sugar and one or more phosphate groups
is called a nucleotide. A polymer comprising multiple linked nucleotides (as
in DNA) is called a polynucleotide.
The backbone of the DNA strand is made from alternating phosphate and
sugar residues. The sugar in DNA is 2-deoxyribose, which is a pentose (fivecarbon) sugar. The sugars are joined together by phosphate groups that form
phosphodiester bonds between the third and fifth carbon atoms of adjacent
sugar rings. These asymmetric bonds mean a strand of DNA has a direction.
The DNA double helix is stabilized primarily by two forces: hydrogen bonds
between nucleotides and base-stacking interactions among aromatic
nucleobases

RNA
What is RNA?
o is a family of large biological molecules that perform multiple vital
roles in the coding, decoding, regulation, and expression of genes.
o Together with DNA, RNA comprises the nucleic acids, which, along
with proteins, constitute the three major macromolecules essential
for all known forms of life.

Like DNA, RNA is assembled as a chain of nucleotides, but is

usually single-stranded. Cellular organisms use messenger
RNA (mRNA) to convey genetic information (often notated
using the letters G, A, U, and C for the nucleotides guanine,
adenine, uracil and cytosine) that directs synthesis of specific
proteins, while many viruses encode their genetic information
using an RNA genome.

 Some RNA molecules play an active role within cells by

catalyzing biological reactions, controlling gene expression, or
sensing and communicating responses to cellular signals.
One of these active processes is protein synthesis, a universal
function whereby mRNA molecules direct the assembly of
proteins on ribosomes. This process uses transfer RNA (tRNA)
molecules to deliver amino acids to the ribosome, where
ribosomal RNA (rRNA) links amino acids together to form
proteins.
While DNA contains deoxyribose, RNA contains ribose (in
deoxyribose there is no hydroxyl group attached to the
pentose ring in the 2' position). These hydroxyl groups make
RNA less stable than DNA because it is more prone to
hydrolysis.
The complementary base to adenine is not thymine, as it is in
DNA, but rather uracil, which is an unmethylated form of
thymine.