Protein Synthesis Essay

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Cells have to make proteins to work. The process in which a cell makes the proteins is called protein synthesis. The first step of this process is opening up the DNA. Each little portion of DNA has a different recipe for a protein. When a protein is made in a cell, it is called gene expression, for the gene was shown. As the DNA is unwound and unzipped, transcription is occurring. Transcription is the process of going from DNA to mRNA. RNA is half a strand of DNA that uses the base uracil instead of thymine. mRNA is a type of RNA that is formed by putting complementary bases on the unzipped portion of DNA. When DNA’s code is being copied, it is copied into groups of 3 bases at a time, called codons. The mRNA is now in triplet code, the standard form of DNA/RNA. When the mRNA strand is copied, it moves out of the nucleus to go find a ribosome, the protein maker. When the mRNA finds a ribosome to make it’s protein, they are not able to understand each other. A translator is needed, which is where tRNA comes in. Translation is the process of taking mRNA to a ribosome and making a protein. tRNA is the only way making a protein is possible- it’s the one that reads mRNA and goes to get the amino acids! A strand of tRNA carries two things; an amino acid and an anti-codon. Amino acids are the monomers of proteins, and anti-codons are the complementary bases to the mRNA codons. In order for us to tell what amino acid a codon of mRNA* is coding for, we use a codon chart. During protein synthesis, there is room for many mistakes! A mistake in the copying/translating of the RNA is called a mutation. There are three different types of mutation- substitution/point mutation, insertion with frameshift, and deletion with frameshift. Substitution and point mutation are the same things. It’s when one complementary base is accidently copied over as another complementary base.

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