DNA structure and replication (4) Flashcards
Why were proteins believed to be the genetic material?
diversity of their composition (20 amino acids) and their presence in chromosomes
Fredrik Griffith
used pneumonia causing bacteria on mice, concluded that a strain could transfer its genetic material to another strain
Oswald Avery, Colin McLeod, Maclyn McCarty
used DNase, RNase, and protase on strands in in vitro study. Found that the sample with DNase was the only one that did not transfer its genetic material to another
Bacteriophages
viruses infecting bacterial
Alfred Hershey and Martha Chase
used varuses and labeled dna and proteins. injected to bacterial.
centrifuged, found the pellet fraction contained most of the dna label.
concluded dna was the genetic material injected
Linus Pauling
proposed dna had a triple helix structure
dna
-nucleotide bases
-covalent bonds in a polymer
dna double helix 1
- dna consists of two strands that are h-boded together
dna double helix 2
- the two strands turn right to make a right-handed helix
dna double helix 3
the hydrophilic sugar phosphate is on the outside of the helix,
the negatively charged p groups make DNA souble in aqueous solutions
dna double helix 4
the hydrophobic nitrogenous bases are staked inside in a perpendicular manner to the strand. there are 10 bases per turn
dna double helix 5
-complimentary base pairing
- adenine pairs with thymine with 2 H-bonds and guanine pairs with cytosine with 3 H-bonds
- satisfices charagaff’s findings
dna double helix 6
- the two strands run in oppositite directions (anti-parallel orientation)
- The starting of dna has a phosphate group attached to the 5th C of ribose
- The other end has a -OH group attached to the 3rd C of ribose
dna double helix 7
the helical turns make a major groove and a minor groove between the adjacent turns
dna double helix 8
dna stores information in its sequence of bases
dna double helix 9
based on the complimentary base pairing, dna replication was proposed to be semiconservative
- the new copy is made from a template dna with high specificity
Where does supercoiled dna occur?
in circular dna (plasmids, bacterial chromosomes, chloroplast, and mitochondrial dna) and linear eukaryotic chromosomes
Why is supercoiling important?
Important to keep dna compact in the cell and during dna replication