<< Chapter < Page Chapter >> Page >
By the end of this section, you will be able to:
  • Describe the structure of DNA
  • Describe how eukaryotic and prokaryotic DNA is arranged in the cell

In the 1950s, Francis Crick and James Watson worked together at the University of Cambridge, England, to determine the structure of DNA. X-ray crystallography is a method for investigating molecular structure Researcher Rosalind Franklin used X-ray crystallography to understand the structure of DNA. Watson and Crick were able to piece together the puzzle of the DNA molecule using Franklin's data ( [link] ).

Photo in part A shows James Watson, Francis Crick, and Maclyn McCarty. The x-ray diffraction pattern in part b is symmetrical, with dots in an x-shape.
Pioneering scientists (a) James Watson and Francis Crick are pictured here with American geneticist Maclyn McCarty. Scientist Rosalind Franklin discovered (b) the X-ray diffraction pattern of DNA, which helped to elucidate its double helix structure. (credit a: modification of work by Marjorie McCarty; b: modification of work by NIH)

Now let’s consider the structure of the two types of nucleic acids, deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and ribonucleic acid (RNA). The building blocks of DNA are nucleotides, which are made up of three parts: a deoxyribose    (5-carbon sugar), a phosphate group    , and a nitrogenous base    ( [link] ). There are four types of nitrogenous bases in DNA. Adenine (A) and guanine (G) are double-ringed purines, and cytosine (C) and thymine (T) are smaller, single-ringed pyrimidines. The nucleotide is named according to the nitrogenous base it contains.

Illustration shows structure of a nucleotide, which is made up of a deoxyribose sugar with a nitrogenous base attached at the 1' position and a phosphate group attached at the 5' position. There are two kinds of nitrogenous bases: pyrimidines, which have one six-membered ring, and purines, which have a six-membered ring fused to a five-membered ring. Cytosine and thymine are pyrimidines, and adenine and guanine are purines.
(a) Each DNA nucleotide is made up of a sugar, a phosphate group, and a base. (b) Cytosine and thymine are pyrimidines. Guanine and adenine are purines.

The phosphate group of one nucleotide bonds covalently with the sugar molecule of the next nucleotide, and so on, forming a long polymer of nucleotide monomers. The sugar–phosphate groups line up in a “backbone” for each single strand of DNA, and the nucleotide bases stick out from this backbone. The phosphate group is attached to the 5' carbon of one nucleotide and the 3' carbon of the next nucleotide. In its natural state, each DNA molecule is actually composed of two single strands held together along their length with hydrogen bonds between the bases.

Watson and Crick proposed that the DNA is made up of two strands that are twisted around each other to form a right-handed helix, called a double helix    . Base-pairing takes place between a purine and pyrimidine: namely, A pairs with T, and G pairs with C. In other words, adenine and thymine are complementary base pairs, and cytosine and guanine are also complementary base pairs. Because of their complementarity, there is as much adenine as thymine in a DNA molecule and as much guanine as cytosine. Adenine and thymine are connected by two hydrogen bonds, and cytosine and guanine are connected by three hydrogen bonds. ( [link] ).

Part A shows an illustration of a DNA double helix, which has a sugar phosphate backbone on the outside and nitrogenous base pairs on the inside. Part B shows base-pairing between thymine and adenine, which form two hydrogen bonds, and between guanine and cytosine, which form three hydrogen bonds.
DNA (a) forms a double stranded helix, and (b) adenine pairs with thymine and cytosine pairs with guanine. (credit a: modification of work by Jerome Walker, Dennis Myts)

The structure of rna

There is a second nucleic acid in all cells called ribonucleic acid, or RNA. Like DNA, RNA is a polymer of nucleotides. Each of the nucleotides in RNA is made up of a nitrogenous base, a five-carbon sugar, and a phosphate group. In the case of RNA, the five-carbon sugar is ribose, not deoxyribose. ( [link] ).

Get Jobilize Job Search Mobile App in your pocket Now!

Get it on Google Play Download on the App Store Now




Source:  OpenStax, Environmental biology. OpenStax CNX. Aug 10, 2015 Download for free at https://legacy.cnx.org/content/col11863/1.1
Google Play and the Google Play logo are trademarks of Google Inc.

Notification Switch

Would you like to follow the 'Environmental biology' conversation and receive update notifications?

Ask