Transversion, in molecular biology, refers to a point mutation in DNA in which a single purine (A or G) is

changed for a pyrimidine (T or C), or vice versa. A transversion can be spontaneous, or it can be caused
by ionizing radiation or alkylating agents. It can only be reversed by a spontaneous reversion.

Although there are two possible transversions but only one possible transition, transition mutations are
more likely than transversions because substituting a single ring structure for another single ring
structure is more likely than substituting a double ring for a single ring. Also, transitions are less likely
to result in amino acid substitutions (due to wobble base pair), and are therefore more likely to
persist as "silent substitutions" in populations as single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs. A
transversion usually has a more pronounced effect than a transition because the third nucleotide
codon position of the DNA, which to a large extent is responsible for the degeneracy of the code, is
more tolerant of transition than a transversion: that is, a transition is more likely to encode for the
same amino acid.