On the Regulation of DNA Replication in Bacteria

Abstract

The deoxyribonucleotide sequence containing the genetic information of a cell participates in two distinct chemical processes. In the first one, generally called replication, free deoxyribonucleotides are linearly assembled by specific base-pairing to form an identical sequence, or replica of the original structure. The second process, or transcription, allows the genetic material to perform its physiological functions consisting essentially in the production of specific proteins at a suitable rate. As a first step, transcription involves the production of messengers which carry to the protein-forming-centers the information necessary to specify the structure of the polypeptide chains. Messenger synthesis by DNA is a process probably closely similar to that of replication, with the differences that it involves ribo-, instead of deoxyribonucleotides and that, in all likelihood, only one of the DNA strands is used for copying into an RNA transcript.