Categories
Cell Biology

DNA in numbers

In previous articles, we talked about the two types of cell division, mitosis, and meiosis. We also described the differences between the terms chromatin, chromosome, and sister chromatid. However, if at this point someone asked you to find the number of chromosomes, chromatids, DNA molecules, and others, would you still have difficulty answering? If your […]

Categories
Cell Biology

DNA organization inside the nucleus

Chromosomes, chromatin, nucleosomes, genes, alleles? What is the difference between these terms? What are their roles? And how are they organized inside each one of the small cells of an organism? When you hear these words, you might think that they are pretty much the same, or you may not be able to distinguish their […]

Categories
Cell Biology

Types of cell division

Have you ever wondered how the organs of an embryo develop inside the womb, how the immune system heals infections, or how a tree becomes taller with time? All of the organisms survive, grow, and reproduce by creating new cells. But how do new cells occur? No matter the organism or the type of cells, […]

Categories
Molecular Biology

Unraveling the double helix

We learned in a previous post that in 1952, after a lot of experiments, DNA was accepted by the scientific community as the genetic material of the cells. However, something was still missing, and that was its structure. For many years prior, scientists were conducting experiments, each one unraveling some features of DNA that proved […]

Categories
Molecular Biology

The genetic material

DNA or Deoxyribonucleic acid is the genetic material of all the cells and most viruses, with the exception of some viruses that use another type of nucleic acid, called RNA or Ribonucleic acid. As we will see in the following posts, DNA presents some characteristics that make it the ideal molecule to carry out the […]