Nucleic Acids

• Central dogma is the process of information flow in the cell, from DNA to RNA to protein. The process is transcription and translation.
• DNA is transcribed into messenger RNA (used for translation), transfer RNA (transports amino acids), and ribosomal RNA (part of the ribosome).
• The phenome connects all the “omes” to observable characteristics. These “omes” include genomes (contains all DNA cells), transcriptomes (all RNA in a cell at a particular time), proteomes (all proteins in a cell at a particular time), interactomes (protein-protein interactions in a cell at a particular time), and metabolomes (metabolites in a cell at a particular time).
• Nucleic acids is the genetic material in a cell
• DNA (Deoxyribonucleic acid) is a polymer of nucleic acids which dictates function of a cell
• DNA consist of a phosphate group and a pentose sugar (forming the backbone ) and a nitrogenous base that is bonded to its complementary base, which makes DNA double-stranded
• Pyrimidine bases include cytosine, uracil, and thymine, which all have a single ring
• Beta-D- ribose in ribonucleic acid has a hydroxyl (OH) on carbon 2
• Beta-D- oxyribose in deoxyribonucleic acid has a hydrogen on carbon 2
• Nucleoside has a base, sugar, and no phosphate group
• Nucleotide has a base, sugar, and one or more phosphate groups
• Nucleotides are linked by phosphodiester bonds
• DNA strands are antiparallel (5’ to 3’ end, 3’ to 5’ end)
• Adenine always pairs with thymine through two hydrogen bonds
• Cytosine always pairs with guanine through three hydrogen bonds
• The DNA double helix is held together by hydrogen bonding between complementary bases.
• To seperate DNA double helice, we need to heat the strands to denature the bonds
• To restore DNA double helice, we need to slowly cool the single strands to renature the helices (nucleotides pairs reform)