What Is Nucleotide

This section provides a quick introduction of nucleotide, which is a nucleoside binding to a phosphate. A nucleotide has 3 components: a nucleobase, a 5-carbon sugar, and a phosphate.

What Is Nucleotide? - A Nucleotide is a nucleoside linked to a phosphate. Nucleotides are building blocks of DNA and RNA.

When a nucleoside and a phosphate go through a condensation reaction, they form an ester bond, resulting a nucleotide and eliminating a water as shown below. Phosphate is shown in pink color.

Nucleoside + Phosphate = Nucleotide
Nucleoside + Phosphate = Nucleotide

Here is another structure diagram that shows the 3 components of a nucleotide: a nucleobase in blue, a 5-carbon sugar in pink, and a phosphate in yellow (source: dcccd.edu).

Nucleotide: Nucleobase + 5-Carbon Sugar + Phosphate
NucleNucleotide: Nucleobase + 5-Carbon Sugar + Phosphate

Notice that the 5 carbon atoms in the deoxyribose are index from 1' to 5' starting from the N-glycosidic bond (linking to the nucleobase) and ending at the ester bond (linking to the phosphate).

This indexes give the nucleotide a sense of direction, going from the top (called the 5' end) to the bottom (called the 3' end).

Table of Contents

 About This Book

 Introduction of Molecules

 Molecule Names and Identifications

 Molecule Mass and Weight

 Protein and Amino Acid

Nucleobase, Nucleoside, Nucleotide, DNA and RNA

 What Is Nucleobase

 What Is Nucleoside

What Is Nucleotide

 What Is Nucleic Acid

 What Is RNA (Ribonucleic Acid)

 What Is DNA (Deoxyribonucleic Acid)

 RNA Primary Structure - Helix

 DNA Primary Structure - Double Helix

 What Is DNA/RNA Base and Sequence Pair

 What Is Chromosome

 Gene and Chromosome

 Protein Kinase (PK)

 DNA Sequencing

 Gene Mutation

 SDF (Structure Data File)

 PyMol Installation

 PyMol GUI and CLI

 PyMol Selections

 PyMol Editing Functions

 PyMol Measurement Functions

 PyMol Movie Functions

 PyMol Python Integration

 PyMol Object Functions

 ChEMBL Database - European Molecular Biology Laboratory

 PubChem Database - National Library of Medicine

 PDB (Protein Data Bank)

 INSDC (International Nucleotide Sequence Database Collaboration)

 HGNC (HUGO Gene Nomenclature Committee)

 Relocated Tutorials

 Resources and Tools

 Molecule Related Terminologies

 References

 Full Version in PDF/EPUB