AP Biology Chapter 16 and 17 Vocabulary Flashcards
bacteriophage
A virus that infects bacteria; also called a phage.
DNA ligase
A linking enzyme essential for DNA replication; catalyzes the covalent bonding of the 3’ end of a new DNA fragment to the 5’ end of a growing chain.
DNA polymerase
An enzyme that catalyzes the elongation of new DNA at a replication fork by the addition of nucleotides to the existing chain.
double helix
The form of native DNA, referring to its two adjacent polynucleotide strands wound into a spiral shape.
helicase
An enzyme that untwists the double helix of DNA at the replication forks.
lagging strand
A discontinuously synthesized DNA strand that elongates in a direction away from the replication fork.
leading strand
The new continuous complementary DNA strand synthesized along the template strand in the mandatory 5’ ( 3’ direction.
mismatch repair
The cellular process that uses special enzymes to fix incorrectly paired nucleotides.
nuclease
An enzyme that hydrolyzes DNA and RNA into their component nucleotides.
nucleotide excision repair
The process of removing and then correctly replacing a damaged segment of DNA using the undamaged strand as a guide.
Okazaki fragment
A short segment of DNA synthesized on a template strand during DNA replication. Many Okazaki fragments make up the lagging strand of newly synthesized DNA.
origin of replication
Site where the replication of a DNA molecule begins.
phage
A virus that infects bacteria; also called a bacteriophage.
primase
An enzyme that joins RNA nucleotides to make the primer.
primer
A polynucleotide with a free 3´ end, bound by complementary base pairing to the template strand, that is elongated during DNA replication.
replication fork
A Y-shaped region on a replicating DNA molecule where new strands are growing.
semiconservative model
Type of DNA replication in which the replicated double helix consists of one old strand, derived from the old molecule, and one newly made strand.
single-strand binding protein
During DNA replication, molecules that line up along the unpaired DNA strands, holding them apart while the DNA strands serve as templates for the synthesis of complementary strands of DNA.
telomerase
An enzyme that catalyzes the lengthening of telomeres. The enzyme includes a molecule of RNA that serves as a template for new telomere segments.
telomere
The protective structure at each end of a eukaryotic chromosome. Specifically, the tandemly repetitive DNA at the end of the chromosome’s DNA molecule. See also repetitive DNA.
topoisomerase
A protein that functions in DNA replication, helping to relieve strain in the double helix ahead of the replication fork.
transformation
(1) The conversion of a normal animal cell to a cancerous cell. (2) A change in genotype and phenotype due to the assimilation of external DNA by a cell.
5’ cap
The 5’ end of a pre-mRNA molecule modified by the addition of a cap of guanine nucleotide.
A site
One of a ribosome’s three binding sites for tRNA during translation. The A site holds the tRNA carrying the next amino acid to be added to the polypeptide chain. (A stands for aminoacyl tRNA.)
alternative RNA splicing
A type of regulation at the RNA-processing level in which different mRNA molecules are produced from the same primary transcript, depending on which RNA segments are treated as exons and which as introns.
aminoacyl-tRNA synthetase
An enzyme that joins each amino acid to the correct tRNA.
anticodon
A specialized base triplet at one end of a tRNA molecule that recognizes a particular complementary codon on an mRNA molecule.