Activity
DNA polymerase III synthesizes base pairs at a rate of around 1000 nucleotides per second. DNA Pol III activity begins after strand separation at the origin of replication. Because DNA synthesis cannot start de novo, an RNA primer, complementary to part of the single-stranded DNA, is synthesized by primase (an RNA polymerase):
("!" for RNA, '"$" for DNA, "*" for polymerase)
--------> * * * * ! ! ! ! _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ | RNA | <--ribose (sugar)-phosphate backbone G U A U | Pol | <--RNA primer * * * * |_ _ _ _| <--hydrogen bonding C A T A G C A T C C <--template ssDNA (single-stranded DNA) _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ <--deoxyribose (sugar)-phosphate backbone $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $Read more about this topic: DNA Polymerase III Holoenzyme
Famous quotes containing the word activity:
“I see advertisements for active young men, as if activity were the whole of a young man’s capital. Yet I have been surprised when one has with confidence proposed to me, a grown man, to embark in some enterprise of his, as if I had absolutely nothing to do, my life having been a complete failure hitherto. What a doubtful compliment this to pay me!”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The Good of man is the active exercise of his soul’s faculties in conformity with excellence or virtue.... Moreover this activity must occupy a complete lifetime; for one swallow does not make spring, nor does one fine day; and similarly one day or a brief period of happiness does not make a man supremely blessed and happy.”
—Aristotle (384–322 B.C.)
“Life is a series of diminishments. Each cessation of an activity either from choice or some other variety of infirmity is a death, a putting to final rest. Each loss, of friend or precious enemy, can be equated with the closing off of a room containing blocks of nerves ... and soon after the closing off the nerves atrophy and that part of oneself, in essence, drops away. The self is lightened, is held on earth by a gram less of mass and will.”
—Coleman Dowell (1925–1985)