Genetics

Music and genomes: Beethoven's genes put to the test

To what extent are exceptional human achievements influenced by genetic factors? This question, dating back to the early days of human genetics, seems to be easier to address today as modern molecular methods make it possible ...

Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes

Researchers map how measles virus spreads in human brain

Mayo Clinic researchers mapped how the measles virus mutated and spread in the brain of a person who succumbed to a rare, lethal brain disease. New cases of this disease, which is a complication of the measles virus, may ...

Genetics

Developing deep learning models to understand the human genome

Northwestern Medicine scientists have developed a deep learning algorithm capable of identifying the location where a genetic process called polyadenylation occurs on the genome, according to findings published in Nature ...

Genetics

Researchers develop new method for prenatal genetic testing

A team of investigators from Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH), and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard have developed a non-invasive genetic test that can screen the blood of pregnant ...

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DNA sequence

A DNA sequence or genetic sequence is a succession of letters representing the primary structure of a real or hypothetical DNA molecule or strand, with the capacity to carry information as described by the central dogma of molecular biology.

The possible letters are A, C, G, and T, representing the four nucleotide bases of a DNA strand — adenine, cytosine, guanine, thymine — covalently linked to a phosphodiester backbone. In the typical case, the sequences are printed abutting one another without gaps, as in the sequence AAAGTCTGAC, read left to right in the 5' to 3' direction. Short sequences of nucleotides are referred to as oligonucleotides and are used in a range of laboratory applications in molecular biology. With regard to biological function, a DNA sequence may be considered sense or antisense, and either coding or noncoding. DNA sequences can also contain "junk DNA."

Sequences can be derived from the biological raw material through a process called DNA sequencing.

In some special cases, letters besides A, T, C, and G are present in a sequence. These letters represent ambiguity. Of all the molecules sampled, there is more than one kind of nucleotide at that position. The rules of the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) are as follows:

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