DNA contains the instructions for most of an organism's characteristics. It is the hereditary material of all living things.
DNA is short for deoxyribonucleic acid.
DNA components
Thymine
Sugar
Adenine
Cystocine
Guanine
Phosphate
Incorrect
What is DNA?
The base pairs of the DNA are made up of different components.
Your task is to construct the base pairs of the DNA by moving the correct bases into position.
Hint: only certain bases will pair up.
Bases
Thymine
Adenine
Cystocine
Guanine
Incorrect
What is DNA?
DNA
Here is a strand of DNA.
To test your knowledge of the structure of DNA, build the other strand of this section by moving the nucleotides into position to form base pairs. The strand that you are building is called the complementary DNA strand.
The information encoded in DNA provides the genetic instructions for all an organism's cells for its entire life.
But how does the DNA get into new cells? Every organism begins life as a single cell. Survival depends on cells dividing, so an organism can grow and repair itself. This is called cell division: a cell divides to become two cells, which both divide to become four, then eight, then 16, and so on.
This process continues in some parts of an organism throughout its life.
Proteins are essential for making your body function. They are needed for hair growth, for controlling the level of sugar in your blood and for thousands of other vital functions.
But how does your body know which proteins to create?
People with diabetes produce little or no insulin (a protein produced by the pancreas that controls the body's absorption of sugar). They need to take insulin to control the condition. But where can they get the insulin they need?
Scientists and drug companies use a process called gene splicing to insert the gene responsible for the production of insulin into another organism. The organism can then be grown to create the insulin required to assist diabetics.