Describe the biochemical composition, structure, and replication of DNA.?

Question

Discuss how recombinant DNA techniques may be used to correct a point mutation.

Please Help! AP Student

I have to check my answers by monday and my teacher told me not to trust wikipedia

Answer 1

I suggest visiting wikipedia for all your DNA structure needs. Its easier than explaining it on here and probably more informative.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DNA

Recombinant DNA techniques can be used to create point mutations in wild-type sequences, so it can also be used to correct a point mutation to return to a wild-type sequence. Its called site-directed mutagenesis. You can read up on it on Wiki.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutagenesis%2C_site-directed

Not to trust Wikipedia? Why not? Its written by scientists and is pretty accurate. The articles on DNA and site directed mutagenesis are certainly factual and help to explain the processes more thoroughly than some text books.....

Answer 2

DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid, is the hereditary material in humans and almost all other organisms. Nearly every cell in a person’s body has the same DNA. Most DNA is located in the cell nucleus (where it is called nuclear DNA), but a small amount of DNA can also be found in the mitochondria (where it is called mitochondrial DNA or mtDNA).

The information in DNA is stored as a code made up of four chemical bases: adenine (A), guanine (G), cytosine (C), and thymine (T). Human DNA consists of about 3 billion bases, and more than 99 percent of those bases are the same in all people. The order, or sequence, of these bases determines the information available for building and maintaining an organism, similar to the way in which letters of the alphabet appear in a certain order to form words and sentences.

DNA bases pair up with each other, A with T and C with G, to form units called base pairs. Each base is also attached to a sugar molecule and a phosphate molecule. Together, a base, sugar, and phosphate are called a nucleotide. Nucleotides are arranged in two long strands that form a spiral called a double helix. The structure of the double helix is somewhat like a ladder, with the base pairs forming the ladder’s rungs and the sugar and phosphate molecules forming the vertical sidepieces of the ladder.

An important property of DNA is that it can replicate, or make copies of itself. Each strand of DNA in the double helix can serve as a pattern for duplicating the sequence of bases. This is critical when cells divide because each new cell needs to have an exact copy of the DNA present in the old cell.

i got it off http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/handbook/basics/dna;jsessionid=D7E2BD08CC6AE3F59250E30BE68F6391

Answer 3

This Site Might Help You.

RE:
Describe the biochemical composition, structure, and replication of DNA.?
Discuss how recombinant DNA techniques may be used to correct a point mutation.

Please Help! AP Student

Answer 4

Biochemically DNA is kinda complex but you can start from the basics: 4 nitrogenous bases (Adenine, Thyamine, Cytocine and Guanine) bonded by hydrogen bridges in a double-helix structure.
Replication occurs to copy the strand of DNA and when the cell divides the daughter can have the genetic info. too, she makes another copy of her DNA strand, cel divison, another copy and so on...

Answer 5

As mentioned above, point mutations can be converted back to wild-type by site-directed mutagenesis. This easiest to do in plasmids in bacteria. Stratagene is a company that sells a site-directed mutagenesis kit. It employs the polymerase chain reaction (PCR), so you might want to read up on that too. The instructions and background materials provided in the stratagene kit can tell you the specifics.