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Nucleic acids RNA (left) and DNA (right). Nucleic acids are large biomolecules that are crucial in all cells and viruses. [1] They are composed of nucleotides, which are the monomer components: a 5-carbon sugar, a phosphate group and a nitrogenous base. The two main classes of nucleic acids are deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and ribonucleic acid ...
The word bacteria is the plural of the Neo-Latin bacterium, which is the romanisation of the Ancient Greek βακτήριον (baktḗrion), [6] the diminutive of βακτηρία (baktēría), meaning "staff, cane", [7] because the first ones to be discovered were rod-shaped. [8] [9]
Metabolism (/ m ə ˈ t æ b ə l ɪ z ə m /, from Greek: μεταβολή metabolē, "change") is the set of life-sustaining chemical reactions in organisms.The three main functions of metabolism are: the conversion of the energy in food to energy available to run cellular processes; the conversion of food to building blocks of proteins, lipids, nucleic acids, and some carbohydrates; and the ...
A macromolecule is a very large molecule important to biological processes, such as a protein or nucleic acid. It is composed of thousands of covalently bonded atoms . Many macromolecules are polymers of smaller molecules called monomers .
Viruses are capsid-encoding organisms composed of proteins and nucleic acids that can self-assemble after replication in a host cell using the host's replication machinery. [41] There is a disagreement in science about whether viruses are living due to their lack of ribosomes . [ 41 ]
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.
NADP is a reducing agent in anabolic reactions like the Calvin cycle and lipid and nucleic acid syntheses. NADP exists in two forms: NADP+, the oxidized form, and NADPH, the reduced form. NADP is similar to nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD), but NADP has a phosphate group at the C-2′ position of the adenosyl.
This nucleic acid binding is strengthened by electrostatic attraction between the positive lysine side chains and the negative nucleic acid phosphate backbones. Additionally, it is possible to model RNPs computationally. [25] Although computational methods of deducing RNP structures are less accurate than experimental methods, they provide a ...