Home
*
I Can Do That!
Cells
DNA
RNA
Protein
synthesis
synthesis for parents
detail
detail for parents
Clones
*
Ask Dr. Pat
Science in the News

email us

 
Ask Dr. Pat

Science News

PROTEIN SYNTHESIS:
Page 1

Teachers, Students, Home School Scholars, and Inquiring Minds of all ages --

Messenger RNA leaves the nucleus by passing through one of the pores in the nuclear membrane.

Once inside the cytoplasm, ribosomes link onto the end of the mRNA and begin to synthesize proteins according to the sequence of nucleotides that comprises the mRNA.

It takes three nucleotides to code for one amino acid.  This is called a 'codon'.  This was a particularly difficult secret to unravel in biology.

There is one type of transfer RNA for each possible codon.  On one end of the tRNA is an 'anti-codon' which recognizes and binds to the mRNA codon.  At the other end is a specific amino acid that corresponds to the codon.

The ribosomes then attach the newly arriving amino acid to the growing amino acid chain.  An amino acid chain is also known as a protein.

PROTEIN SYNTHESIS:    Page 1

Protein Synthesis Links of choice:
Biochemistry - protein synthesis (textbook by Berg, Tymoczko, and Lubert) on the National Institutes of Health website
Wikipedia - protein synthesis
DNA From the Very Beginning - concept = codons
DNA From the Very Beginning - concept = 1 gene/1 protein

Learn more! Google:
cell science projects
homework help
animal cells
cell models
science curriculum

	Web EurekaScience.com

| home | i can do that! |  ask dr. pat | science in the news|

©Copyright, 1998-2008, Eureka ! Science, Corp.
All Rights Reserved
I Can Do That! is a trademark of Eureka ! Science, Corp.