SUMMARY OF REPORT

GROUP 5
“NUCLEIC ACIDS”

SUMMITED BY:
LUMAGLAG, HANA B.
KALINGGALAN, DISMUNA

SUBMITTED TO:
SAPA, JAYSON
 NU NNUCLEIC ACIDS
•Nucleic acids are the least talked about
biomolecule but the most fundamental constituent
of the living cell because all other biomolecules are
programmed in these.

•Even the common questions,why do I have curly or

straight hair, dark or fair skin, short or tall stature,
bring us down to these molecules.

•The succeeding parts of the unit will highlight the

differences between the two nucleic acids- DNA
and RNA. Deoxyribonucleic acid or DNA is mainly
the storehouse of genetic information while
ribonucleic acid of RNA reads out this information.

NUCLEOSIDE AND NUCLEOTIDE

• One strand of nucleic acid is made of a
polynucleotide which is composed of repeating units
of nucleotide.

•A nucleotide is composed of the following: a

nitrogen base, a 5-carbon sugar and a phosphoric
acid. Without the phosphate group, it is called a
nucleoside.

WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN

NUCLEOSIDE AND NUCLEOTIDE?

•The main difference lies in their molecular

composition as Nucleoside contain only sugar and a
base whereas Nucleotides contain sugar, base and
a phosphate group as well. A nucleotide is what
occurs before RNA and DNA, while the nucleoside
occurs before the nucleotide itself.

NITROGENOUS BASE OF NUCLEIC ACIDS

•Note that the purines (adenine and guanine) are
composed of two fused rings incorporating two
nitrogen atoms in each ring and the pyrimidines
(cytosine, thymine and uracil) are composed of a
single ring with two nitrogen atoms in the ring
structure.

•Further, the atoms on the nitrogen bases normally

use a regular numbering system,whereas sugar
components use prime numbers.

STRUCTURE OF 5- CARBON SUGAR OF

NUCLEIC ACIDS
• The 5-carbon sugars found in nucleic acids are D-
ribose and D-deoxyribose. The arrows in Figure 7.3
point to where the nitrogen base attaches. THE
COMMEN RIBONUCLEOSIDES
•Remember that nitrogen base plus sugar is a
nucleoside. The linkage is via a glycosidic bond
which is always of the ß-configuration.

A STRAND OF DNA
•The sequence of bases, referred to as the primary
structure of the Nucleic Acids, where the genetic
information is stored. The "individuality" of the
polynucleotides lies in the specific sequence of the
bases.
THE ANTIPARALLEL AND BASE PAIRING OF
DNA DOUBLE HELIX
•The double helix is the predominant secondary
structure of DNA. James Watson and Francis
Crick's model marked the beginning of the modern
era of molecular biology.

•The critical point is that the strands are anti

parallel and are held together by hydrogen bonds.
Base pairing is the phenomenon where H bonds.
pair the bases of nucleotides of one strand to
complementary bases of the other.

• The pairing through hydrogen bonding should

always between a purine in one chain and
pyrimidine in the other.

•Adenine can pair off only with thymine through 2

H-bonds, while guanine pairs off only with cytosine
through 3 H-bonds.

•There are other secondary structures of nucleic

acids. In addition to the B form of the DNA found in
cells, there is the A form typical of DNA-RNA and
RNA-RNA structures.

• The third form is the Z DNA which is the most

unusual. Other unusual secondary structures are
hairpins, cruciform, triple helices and H DNA. For a
circular DNA the common Tertiary Structure is the
supercoil.

FLOW OF GENETIC INFORMATION

•DNA is often called the 'blueprint of life', for
example, having curly hair, brown eyes, or ability to
roll the tongue, are characteristics resulting from the
proteins our body makes. DNA REPLICATION

•DNA replication is easy to understand. It is simply

DNA making a copy of itself. It is semi conservative
that means each newly synthesized molecule
contains 1 "parent template" strand and one new
"daughter strand". This process is closely
coordinated with cell division.

• DNA REPLICATION PHASES

INITIATION - Prèparing the DNA template -

Helicase unwinds DNA forming a "replication fork." -
Multiple replication forks along a DNA molecule
create replication bubbles AA

ELONGATION --RNA primase adds a

complementary RNA primer to each template strand
as a starting point for replication. -DNA synthesized
in the direction of the replication fork is called a
leading strand; an RNA primer is laid down on the
other strand, the lagging strand and new
nucleotides are added 5' 3 moving away from the
replication fork.

TERMINATION --A different type of DNA

polymerase removes the RNA primer and replaces
it with DNA -DNA ligase joins two Okazaki
fragments with phosphodiester bonds to produce a
continuous chain; each new DNA molecule is
rewound by helicase.

"RNA SYNTHESIS TRANSCRIPTION STEP"

INITIATION -RNA polymerase binds to a promoter
which is a region of bases that signals the
beginning of a gene. The double helix unwinds and
is ready to be transcribed.

ELONGATION
-RNA polymerase moves along the protein
- encoding gene adding new RNA nucleotides in the
5' to 3' direction and complementary to the DNA
template.

TERMINATION
-RNA polymerase reaches the termination

TRANSLATION STEPS
IINITIATION- Start codoon AUG and anticodon with
methionine bind at P site

ELONGATION- Codon recognition

-peptide bond formation
-Transiocation; ribosome moves along mRNA,
aminoacyl tRNA shifts from A site to P site

TERMINATION- A stop codon is reached

-UAA UAG UGA
-All parts release