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Biology vocabulary · Genetics and Heredity

RNA

Meaning in biology, with examples

/ˌɑːr en ˈeɪ/abbreviationCore term

In biology, RNA means: Short for ribonucleic acid, a usually single-stranded molecule that carries genetic information from DNA and helps build proteins. It contains uracil instead of thymine.

In Turkish: RNA, ribonükleik asit

How it is used

The main types are messenger RNA (mRNA), transfer RNA (tRNA) and ribosomal RNA (rRNA). Some viruses use RNA instead of DNA as their genetic material. Lab phrases: RNA extraction, RNA sequencing (RNA-seq), RNA degradation.

Example sentences

  1. RNA degrades quickly, so we keep the samples at −80 °C.

  2. During transcription, a strand of messenger RNA is copied from the DNA template.

Common collocations

  • messenger RNA
  • RNA extraction
  • RNA sequencing
  • RNA virus
  • single-stranded RNA
  • DNAShort for deoxyribonucleic acid, the molecule that stores genetic information in every cell and in many viruses. It is made of two strands twisted into a double helix.
  • transcriptionThe first step of gene expression, in which the DNA sequence of a gene is copied into a matching strand of RNA by the enzyme RNA polymerase.
  • translationThe step of gene expression in which a ribosome reads the codons in messenger RNA and joins the matching amino acids together to build a protein.
  • ribosomeA small structure made of RNA and protein that builds proteins by reading the instructions in messenger RNA. Ribosomes are found in all cells.
  • nucleotideThe basic building block of DNA and RNA, made of a sugar, a phosphate group and a nitrogen-containing base such as adenine (A), thymine (T), guanine (G) or cytosine (C).

This word in other fields

The same English word can have a different meaning in another field:

More terms: Genetics and Heredity

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