Università degli Studi di Catania

CHEMICAL BASES AND MOLECULAR ORGANIZATION OF LIFE

Water

Carbohydrates

Lipids

Proteins: proteins structural organization; regulation of proteins biological activity.

Nucleic Acids: Griffith, Avery, Hershey e Chase, Watson e Crick, Franklin’s experiments. Chemical structure of nucleic acids (RNA and DNA). Chromatin and chromosomes structure.

BASES OF BIOLOGICAL ORGANIZATION

Organisms classification

Evolution

Structure and function of prokaryotic cells (Bacteria and Archea): plasmatic membrane, cell wall, nucleoid.

Structure and function of eukaryotic cells: plasma membrane, nucleus, nucleolus, nucleoplasm, endoplasmic reticulum, ribosomes, Golgi apparatus, lysosomes, peroxisomes, cytoscheleton (microfilaments, microtubules, intermediate filaments).

GENE FUNCTION AND STRUCTURE

Structure of prokaryotic genes: organization of operons.

Structure of eukaryotic genes: function of promoters, exons and introns.

DNA DUPLICATION

Semi-conservative replication. General features of DNA duplication: DNA-polymerases, topoisomerases, replication fork, Okazaki fragments, ‘proofreading activity’. Replication in bacteria. Replication in eukaryotes: telomeres replication. Mechanisms of DNA repair: repair of thymine dimers, base excision repair, nucleotide excision repair, mismatch repair.

TRANSCRIPTION AND RNA MATURATION

Central dogma of molecular biology. Structure and function of first, second and third class RNAs. General features of transcription. RNA polymerases. Transcription factors. Transcription in prokayiotes: start and termination of rho-dependent and-independent transcription. Transcription in eukaryiotes: formation of the pre-initiation complex, end of transcription. Mechanism of mRNA maturation: capping, polyA tail, splicing. rRNA and tRNA maturation.

PROTEIN SYNTHESIS

Properties of the genetic code. Translation apparatus: structure and functions of tRNA and ribosomes. Translation initiation. Elongation. Termination. Differences among eukaryiotes and prokaryiotes. Protein folding. Proteasome-mediated protein degradation.

MUTATIONS

Functional, evolutionary and pathological meaning of mutations. Spontaneous and induced mutations. Point mutations and their classification. Triplet expansion mutations: exemples of pathologies. Chromosome mutations: classification and onset mechanisms. Exemples of patholies caused by chromosomes mutations. Polymorphisms: SNPs, VNTR, InDel. SNPs functional classification and their role in modern biomedicine.

MENDELIAN GENETICS

Mendel’s experiments. The three Mendel’s laws. Chromosomal theory of heredity. Morgan’s experiments and association between genes. Concepts of dominance, recessività, incomplete dominance, co-dominance, penetrance, expressivity. Genealogic trees. Dominant autosomal characters, recessive autosomal characters, Xlinked dominand and recessive characters, Y-linked characters.

CHIMICA E BIOCHIMICA BIOLOGIA E GENETICA - channel 1

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