Replication Enzymes
The enzyme that unwinds the DNA helix by breaking hydrogen bonds between bases.
What is helicase?
The structure that forms when DNA unwinds at the start of replication.
What is the replication fork?
The four nucleotide bases found in DNA.
What are adenine, thymine, cytosine, and guanine?
This phase of DNA replication begins when helicase unwinds the double helix to expose the template strands.
What is initiation?
This enzyme proofreads newly added nucleotides and corrects mistakes during replication.
What is DNA polymerase?
The enzyme that adds new nucleotide bases to the parent or template strand to form a new DNA strand.
What is DNA polymerase
The DNA strand that is synthesised continuously in the same direction that helicase unwinds the double helix.
What is the leading strand?
The base that pairs with adenine in DNA.
What is thymine.
This process describes how each new DNA molecule contains one original strand and one newly synthesised strand.
What is semi‑conservative replication?
During replication, this strand is built in short segments because DNA polymerase cannot follow helicase directly.
What is the lagging strand?
The enzyme which joins the Okazaki fragments together on the lagging strand.
The DNA strand that is synthesised discontinuously, producing short fragments during replication.
What is the lagging strand?
The base that pairs with cytosine in DNA.
What is guanine?
This term describes the overall process of copying DNA before cell division.
What is DNA replication?
This protein binds to single‑stranded DNA to prevent the strands from re‑annealing during replication.
What are single‑stranded binding proteins?
The enzyme which synthesises the short RNA primers needed to begin DNA replication.
What is RNA primase?
The short DNA fragments synthesised discontinuously on the lagging strand.
What are Okazaki fragments?
A set of three nucleotide bases that encodes for a specific amino acid.
What is a codon?
This enzyme seals the final bonds in the sugar‑phosphate backbone to complete each Okazaki fragment.
What is DNA ligase?
This molecule must be laid down before DNA polymerase can begin adding nucleotides to a new strand.
What is an RNA primer?
The enzyme that replaces the RNA primers on the lagging strand.
What is DNA polymerase?
The direction DNA polymerase adds free complementary nucleotides during replication.
The difference between RNA and DNA.
What is an oxygen?
This enzyme relieves tension ahead of the replication fork by cutting and rejoining DNA.
What is topoisomerase?
During DNA replication, this term describes the point where DNA polymerase stops synthesising because it reaches the end of the template strand.
What is termination?