STRUCTURE AND FUNCTIONS OF NUCLEIC ACIDS

NUCLEIC ACIDS
• Nucleic acids are large biomolecules, essential to all known forms of life
• Nucleic acid is the overall name for DNA and RNA, members of a family of biopolymers
• There are two forms of nucleic acid in the cells of living organisms viz., Deoxyribonucleic acid
(DNA) and Ribonucleic acid (RNA)
• If the sugar is a compound ribose, the polymer is RNA (ribonucleic acid); if the sugar is derived
from ribose as deoxyribose, the polymer is DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid)
• DNA is the hereditary material of all higher organisms and it is found in all the cells. RNA is the
genetic material of some viruses
• Genes are composed of DNA and DNA is the bearer of the genetic information
• Amount of DNA is specific for a species and is constant in the diploid nucleus of that species. The
haploid nuclei have half of this amount of DNA
• There is a constant quantity of DNA for each set of chromosomes
• Nucleic acids were named for their initial discovery within the nucleus and for the presence of
phosphate groups (related to phosphoric acid)
• Although first discovered within the nucleus of eukaryotic cells, nucleic acids are now known to
be found in all life forms
• All living cells contain both DNA and RNA (except some cells such as mature red blood cells),
while viruses contain either DNA or RNA, but usually not both
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 NUCLEIC ACIDS
• Nuclein were discovered by Friedrich Miescher in 1869
• In 1889, Richard Altmann created the term nucleic acid
• In 1938, Astbury and Bell published the first X-ray diffraction pattern of DNA
• In 1953, Watson and Crick determined the structure of DNA
• Nucleic acids are generally very large molecules. DNA molecules are the largest individual
molecules known
• Naturally occurring DNA molecules are double-stranded and RNA molecules are single-stranded
• Nucleic acids are linear polymers (chains) of nucleotides
• Each nucleotide consists of three components: a purine or pyrimidine nucleobase (sometimes
termed nitrogenous base or simply base), a pentose sugar, and a phosphate group
• The substructure consisting of a nucleobase plus sugar is termed a nucleoside
• Nucleobases found in the two nucleic acids are : adenine (A), cytosine (C) and guanine (G) are
found in both RNA and DNA, while thymine (T) occurs in DNA and uracil (U) occurs in RNA
• Total amount of pyrimidines (thymine and cytosine) is equal to the total amount of purines
(adenine and guanine)

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 NUCLEIC ACIDS
• Nucleotides are joined together to form a polynucleotide chain in which 5’ carbon of one sugar is
linked by its phosphate group to the 3’ carbon of the next sugar
• Chemical bonds by which the sugar components of the adjacent nucleotides are linked through
the phosphate groups (sugar-phosphate backbone) are called phosphodiester bonds
• In conventional nomenclature, the carbons to which the phosphate groups attach are the 3'-end
and the 5'-end carbons of the sugar
• This gives nucleic acids directionality and the ends of nucleic acid molecules are referred to as
5'-end and 3'-end
• This 5’→ 3’ → 5’ → 3’ orientation of these linkages continues throughout the chain. In each
polynucleotide chain there are a 5’ phosphonyl group (5’-p) at one end and 3’-hydroxyl group
(3’-OH) at the other end
• Double-stranded nucleic acids are made up of complementary sequences, in which extensive
Watson-Crick base pairing results in a highly repeated and quite uniform double-helical three-
dimensional structure
• Nucleic acid molecules are usually unbranched and may occur as linear and circular molecules.
For example, bacterial chromosomes, plasmids, mitochondrial DNA, and chloroplast DNA are
usually circular double-stranded DNA molecules, while chromosomes of the eukaryotic nucleus
are usually linear double-stranded DNA molecules. Most RNA molecules are linear, single-
stranded molecules
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 NUCLEIC ACIDS

• One DNA or RNA molecule differs from another primarily in the sequence of nucleotides
• Nucleotide sequences are of great importance in biology since they carry the ultimate
instructions that encode all biological molecules, cellular structures, organs, and organisms
• Experimental studies of nucleic acids constitute a major part of modern biological and medical
research, and form a foundation for genome and forensic science, and biotechnology and
pharmaceutical industries
• Enormous efforts have gone into the development of experimental methods to determine the
nucleotide sequence of biological DNA and RNA molecules
• Today hundreds of millions of nucleotides are sequenced daily at genome centers and smaller
laboratories worldwide
• In addition to maintaining the GenBank nucleic acid sequence database, the National Center for
Biotechnology Information (NCBI, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov) provides analysis and retrieval
resources for the data in GenBank and other biological data made available through the NCBI
website
• Nature has yet to find a better solution than DNA for storing, expressing, and passing along
instructions for making proteins

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 MOLECULAR STRUCTURE OF DNA
• Mammalian chromosomes consist of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) together with basic proteins
of low molecular weight called histones and acidic proteins of high molecular weight called
non-histones

• DNA forms the core of the chromosome and carries the genetic message

• Its double helical structure was first discovered by James Watson and Francis Crick in 1953

• DNA is a polymer (a molecule containing repeating units) composed of a five carbon sugar
(2’deoxyribose) phosphoric acid and four nitrogenous bases

• Two of these nitrogenous bases are (i) Purines (a double ring structure) - Adenine (A) and Guanine
(G) and (ii) Pyrimidines (a single ring structure) - Thymine (T) and Cytosine (C)

• In DNA, each base is chemically linked to a deoxyribose sugar, forming a nucleoside

• A phosphate group is also attached to the sugar of each nucleoside yielding a nucleotide
(a nucleotide is a nucleoside phosphate)

• It is common to name nucleotides as monophosphates i.e., deoxyadenosine 5’- monophosphate

and abbreviated as dAMP for a adenine containing nucleotides and others are named as dGMP,
dCMP and dTMP

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 MOLECULAR STRUCTURE OF DNA

• Nucleotides are joined together to form a polynucleotide chain in which 5’ carbon of one sugar
is linked by its phosphate group to the 3’ carbon of the next sugar

• Two polynucleotide chains twisted around one another forming a double-stranded helix in
which adenine pairs only with thymine (complementary base pairing) and guanine with cytosine

• Contents of purine always equals the contents of pyrimidine

• Amount of adenine and thymine are always equal and so are the amounts of guanine and
cytosine (Chargaff’s rule)

• Each polynucleotide chain consists of nucleotides linked length-wise by way of sugar and
phosphate groups. The two helically coiled polynucleotide chains are bound together cross-wise
by hydrogen bonding between a purine and a pyrimidine

• In the double helix, one polynucleotide strand is in 5’→ 3’ direction and the other is in 3’ → 5’
direction and hence are said to be antiparallel

• Each chain makes one complete turn every 34 A° (1 Angstrom unit = 0.1nm). The bases are
spaced at 3.4 A° such that there are ten base pairs per helical turn

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 MOLECULAR STRUCTURE OF DNA

• Each base is paired to a base in other strand by hydrogen bonds. An A=T pair has two hydrogen
bonds and a G≡C pair has three hydrogen bonds

• Specificity of base pairing is such that each base along one polynucleotide strand of the DNA
determines the base in opposite position on the other strand

• Sequence of bases along the two strands is complementary in nature

• DNA is the information molecule. It stores instructions for making other large molecules, called
proteins

• Important feature of the DNA is its transmission, essentially unchanged, from one generation to
the next

• Implication is that the genetic material must be transmitted unchanged from generation to
generation

• Measurements of the amount of DNA per cell show that it remains essentially the same in the
cells of a given organism

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 Chargaff's Rules
• Important discoveries about DNA were made in the mid-1900s by Erwin Chargaff
• He studied DNA from many different species
• He was especially interested in the four different nitrogen bases of DNA: adenine (A), guanine (G),
cytosine (C), and thymine (T)
• Chargaff found that concentrations of the four bases differed from one species to another
• Within each species, the concentration of adenine was always about the same as the
concentration of thymine. The same was true of the concentrations of guanine and cytosine
• These observations came to be known as Chargaff’s rules in late 1940s
• The significance of the rules would not be revealed until the structure of DNA was discovered
• Chargaff’a rules are called as “Grammar of Biology”
First parity rule
• The first rule holds that a double-stranded DNA molecule, globally has percentage base pair
equality: %A = %T and %G = %C. The rigorous validation of the rule constitutes the basis
of Watson-Crick pairs in the DNA double helix model
Second parity rule
• It states that, in single-stranded DNA, the number of adenine units is approximately equal to that
of thymine (%A ≈ %T), and the number of cytosine units is approximately equal to that of guanine
(%C ≈ %G)

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 MOLECULAR STRUCTURE OF RNA

• Ribonucleic acid (RNA) is a polymeric molecule essential in various biological roles in coding,
decoding, regulation and expression of genes

• Like DNA, RNA is assembled as a chain of nucleotides, but unlike DNA, RNA is found in nature as a
single strand folded onto itself, rather than a paired double strand

• Each nucleotide in RNA contains a ribose sugar, with carbons numbered 1' through 5‘

• A base is attached to the 1' position [adenine (A), cytosine (C), guanine (G), or uracil (U)]

• A phosphate group is attached to the 3' position of one ribose and the 5' position of the next

• Phosphate groups have a negative charge each, making RNA a charged molecule

• Bases form hydrogen bonds between cytosine and guanine, between adenine and uracil

• An important structural component of RNA that distinguishes it from DNA is the presence of
a hydroxyl group at the 2' position of the ribose sugar

• Three types of RNAs are messenger RNA (mRNA), transfer RNA (tRNA) and ribosomal RNA (rRNA)

• Most cells contain more amount of RNA (2 to 8 times higher than DNA)
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 RNA TYPES
• There are various types of RNA, out which most well-known and most commonly studied in the
human body are: mRNA, tRNA and rRNA
mRNA (Messenger RNA)
• mRNA convey genetic information using the nitrogenous bases of guanine, uracil, adenine,
and cytosine that directs synthesis of specific proteins
• mRNA functions by transferring the genetic material into the ribosomes and pass the instructions
about the type of proteins, required by the body cells
• mRNA plays a vital role in the process of transcription or during the protein synthesis process
• mRNA is synthesized in the nucleus during the process of transcription in which the sequence of
bases in one strand of the chromosomal DNA is enzymatically transcribed in the form of a single
strand of mRNA
• Sequence of bases of the mRNA strand so formed is complementary to that of the DNA strand
being transcribed
• After transcription, the mRNA passes into the cytoplasm and then to the ribosomes, where it
serves as the template for the sequential ordering of amino acids during the synthesis of proteins
• mRNA makes up only a very small part of the total RNA of the cell (5%) but, it occurs in many
distinctive forms which vary greatly in molecular weight and base sequence
• Each of the thousands of different proteins synthesized by the cell is coded by a specific mRNA
molecule

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 RNA TYPES
tRNA (Transfer RNA)
• tRNA is responsible for choosing the correct protein or the amino acids required by the body
inturn helping the ribosomes
• tRNA is a relatively small molecule that acts as carriers of specific individual amino acids during
protein synthesis on the ribosomes
• Each of the 20 amino acids has a corresponding tRNA and some have multiple tRNAs
• tRNA exists in as many as 60 forms
• tRNAs are an essential component of translation, where their main function is the transfer of
amino acids during protein synthesis

rRNA (Ribosomal RNA)

• rRNA is the component of the ribosome and are located in the cytoplasm of a cell, where
ribosomes are found
• In all living cells, the rRNA plays a fundamental role in the synthesis and translation of mRNA into
proteins
• rRNA is mainly composed of cellular RNA and are the most predominant RNA within the cells of all
living beings
• rRNA account for 80% of the total RNA present in the cell

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 FUNCTIONS OF RNA
• Ribonucleic acid – RNA, which are mainly composed of nucleic acids, are involved in a variety of
functions within the cell and are found in all living organisms including bacteria, viruses, plants,
and animals

• These nucleic acid functions as a structural molecule in cell organelles and are also involved in the
catalysis of biochemical reactions

• Different types of RNA are involved in various cellular process

Primary functions of RNA

• Facilitate the translation of DNA into proteins

• Functions as an adapter molecule in protein synthesis

• Serves as a messenger between the DNA and the ribosomes

• They are the carrier of genetic information in all living cells

• Promotes the ribosomes to choose the right amino acid which is required in building up of new
proteins in the body

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 Differences between DNA and RNA
DNA RNA
Mostly found in nucleus and
Location Mostly found in the cytoplasm
mitochondria
Sugars and Deoxyribose is the sugar; bases are Ribose is the sugar; bases are A, U, C
Bases A, T, C and G and G
Length Long polymer Short polymer
Base Pairing A pairs with T and C pairs with G A pairs with U and C pairs with G
Double-stranded, spirally twisted to Usually single-stranded, may get folded
Structure
produce a double-helix structure at places to produce pseudohelix
Function Carries the genetic information Mainly involved in protein synthesis
Stability Stable in alkaline conditions Not stable in alkaline conditions
Damage by UV More prone to damage by UV Less prone to damage by UV
Propagation Self-replicating Synthesized from DNA on need-basis
Life time Long-lived Short-lived
Content Constant in all cells Vary from cell to cell
Chargaff’s Rules Obeys Does not obey
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