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Nucleic acids are generally very large molecules. Indeed, DNA molecules are probably the largest individual molecules known. Well-studied biological nucleic acid molecules range in size from 21 nucleotides (small interfering RNA) to large chromosomes (human chromosome 1 is a single molecule that contains 247 million base pairs [18]).
While the sugar-phosphate "backbone" of DNA contains deoxyribose, RNA contains ribose instead. [6] Ribose has a hydroxyl group attached to the pentose ring in the 2' position, whereas deoxyribose does not. The hydroxyl groups in the ribose backbone make RNA more chemically labile than DNA by lowering the activation energy of hydrolysis.
A nucleobase linked to a sugar is called a nucleoside, and a base linked to a sugar and to one or more phosphate groups is called a nucleotide. A biopolymer comprising multiple linked nucleotides (as in DNA) is called a polynucleotide. [13] The backbone of the DNA strand is made from alternating phosphate and sugar groups. [14]
Nucleic acids consist of a chain of linked units called nucleotides. Each nucleotide consists of three subunits: a phosphate group and a sugar (ribose in the case of RNA, deoxyribose in DNA) make up the backbone of the nucleic acid strand, and attached to the sugar is one of a set of nucleobases.
It is this linear sequence of nucleotides that make up the primary structure of DNA or RNA. Nucleotides consist of 3 components: Nitrogenous base. Adenine; Guanine; Cytosine; Thymine (present in DNA only) Uracil (present in RNA only) 5-carbon sugar which is called deoxyribose (found in DNA) and ribose (found in RNA). One or more phosphate ...
L-Ribose Fischer Projection. Ribose is a simple sugar and carbohydrate with molecular formula C 5 H 10 O 5 and the linear-form composition H−(C=O)−(CHOH) 4 −H. The naturally occurring form, d-ribose, is a component of the ribonucleotides from which RNA is built, and so this compound is necessary for coding, decoding, regulation and expression of genes.
Both types of pentoses in DNA and RNA are in their β-furanose (closed five-membered ring) form and they define the identity of a nucleic acid. DNA is defined by containing 2'-deoxy-ribose nucleic acid while RNA is defined by containing ribose nucleic acid. [1] In some occasions, DNA and RNA may contain some minor bases.
Oligonucleotides are short DNA or RNA molecules, oligomers, that have a wide range of applications in genetic testing, research, and forensics.Commonly made in the laboratory by solid-phase chemical synthesis, [1] these small fragments of nucleic acids can be manufactured as single-stranded molecules with any user-specified sequence, and so are vital for artificial gene synthesis, polymerase ...