Nucleic Acids

• Nucleic Acids contain carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, & phosphorus.
• Nucleic Acids: store, transmit, and help express hereditary information (DNA & RNA)
• Gene: amino acid sequence of a polypeptide that is programmed by a unit of inheritance.
• Genes are made of DNA, a nucleic acid made of monomers and nucleotides.
• Nucleotide is made up of a monosaccharide (ribose & deoxyribose), a phosphate group, and a nitrogenous base.
• Nitrogenous bases are cytosine, guanine, adenine, thymine, & uracil.
• Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA)
• Ribonucleic acid (RNA)
• ATP: energy for cellular processes.
• ATP: adenosine triphosphate, a single nucleotide containing three phosphate groups.
• ATP is a high energy molecule and is produced by cellular respiration.
• Phosphodiester bonds is the bond between 2 nucleotides, between phosphate and sugar.
• RNA molecules exist as a single chain.
• DNA molecules have two molecules which form a double helix.
• In DNA, a double helix, the two backbones run in opposite directions from each other (antiparallel).
• There are two families of nitrogenous bases.
• Pyrimidines such as cytosine, thymine & uracil have a single six-membered ring.
• Thymine is the nitrogenous base in DNA.
• Uracil is the nitrogenous base in RNA.
• Pyrimidine Picture.

  
• Purines such as adenine & guanine have a six-membered ring fused to a five-membered ring.
• Purine picture.

  
• Chargaff's Rule is that A = T & C = G.
• A bonds with T & G bonds with C.
• In Chargaff's Rule, the bases are bonded with hydrogen bonds.