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In molecular biology, a polynucleotide (from Ancient Greek πολυς (polys) 'many') is a biopolymer composed of nucleotide monomers that are covalently bonded in a chain. [1] DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) and RNA (ribonucleic acid) are examples of polynucleotides with distinct biological functions.
The nucleotides on one strand base pairs with the nucleotide on the other strand. The secondary structure is responsible for the shape that the nucleic acid assumes. The bases in the DNA are classified as purines and pyrimidines. The purines are adenine and guanine. Purines consist of a double ring structure, a six-membered and a five-membered ...
The application of physics and chemistry to biological problems led to the development of molecular biology, which is particularly concerned with the flow and consequences of biological information from DNA to proteins. The discovery of the DNA double helix made clear that genes are functionally defined parts of DNA molecules, and that there ...
Chemical structure of DNA; hydrogen bonds shown as dotted lines. Each end of the double helix has an exposed 5' phosphate on one strand and an exposed 3′ hydroxyl group (—OH) on the other. DNA is a long polymer made from repeating units called nucleotides .
The primary structure of a biopolymer is the exact specification of its atomic composition and the chemical bonds connecting those atoms (including stereochemistry).For a typical unbranched, un-crosslinked biopolymer (such as a molecule of a typical intracellular protein, or of DNA or RNA), the primary structure is equivalent to specifying the sequence of its monomeric subunits, such as amino ...
The chemical structure of DNA is insufficient to understand the complexity of the 3D structures of DNA. In contrast, animated molecular models allow one to visually explore the three-dimensional (3D) structure of DNA. The DNA model shown (far right) is a space-filling, or CPK, model of the DNA double helix. Animated molecular models, such as ...
In each of these tetraloop families, the second and third nucleotides form a turn in the RNA strand and a base-pair between the first and fourth nucleotides stabilizes the stemloop structure. It has been determined, in general, that the stability of the tetraloop depends on the composition of bases within the loop and on the composition of this ...
In a single strand of DNA or RNA, the chemical convention of naming carbon atoms in the nucleotide pentose-sugar-ring means that there will be a 5′ end (usually pronounced "five-prime end"), which frequently contains a phosphate group attached to the 5′ carbon of the ribose ring, and a 3′ end (usually pronounced "three-prime end"), which ...