Rna

Rna

Ribonucleic acid (RNA) molecules, which are linear chains (or polymers) of ribonucleotides, perform a number of critical functions. Many of these functions are related to protein synthesis. Some RNA molecules bring genetic information from a cell's chromosomes to its ribosomes, where proteins are assembled. Others help ribosomes translate genetic information to assemble specific sequences of amino acids.

Molecular Structure

Ribonucleotides, the building blocks of RNA, are molecules that consist of a nitrogen-containing base, a phosphate group, and ribose, a five-carbon sugar. The nitrogen-containing base may be adenine, cytosine, guanine, or uracil. These four bases are abbreviated as A, C, G, and U.

RNA is similar to deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), another class of nucleic acid. However, DNA nucleotides contain deoxyribose, not ribose, and they use the nitrogen-containing base thymine (T), not uracil, along with ade-nine, cytosine, and guanine.

The nucleotides in DNA and RNA molecules are linked together to form chains. The link between two nucleotides is between a phosphate group attached to the fifth (5′ or "five prime") carbon of the sugar on one nucleotide and a hydroxyl group on the third (3′ or "three prime") carbon of the sugar on the other. The link is called a 5′-3′ phosphodiester bond.

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