Biology:Transition (genetics)

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Short description: DNA mutation that exchanges two nucleotides
Illustration of a transition: each of the 4 nucleotide changes between purines or between pyrimidines (in blue). The 8 other changes are transversions (in red).

Transition, in genetics and molecular biology, refers to a point mutation that changes a purine nucleotide to another purine (AG), or a pyrimidine nucleotide to another pyrimidine (CT). Approximately two out of three single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) are transitions.[1]

Transitions can be caused by oxidative deamination and tautomerization. Although there are twice as many possible transversions, transitions appear more often in genomes,[2] possibly due to the molecular mechanisms that generate them. [3]

5-Methylcytosine is more prone to transition than unmethylated cytosine, due to spontaneous deamination. This mechanism is important because it dictates the rarity of CpG islands.

See also

References

  1. "Rates of transition and transversion in coding sequences since the human-rodent divergence". Genomics 20 (3): 386–96. April 1994. doi:10.1006/geno.1994.1192. PMID 8034311. 
  2. "Genomewide comparison of DNA sequences between humans and chimpanzees". Am. J. Hum. Genet. 70 (6): 1490–7. June 2002. doi:10.1086/340787. PMID 11992255. 
  3. Mezhzherin, S. V.; Tereshchenko, V. O. (2023-06-01). "Genetic Divergence and Evolutionary Transition/Transversion Rate Bias in the Control Region of Mitochondrial DNA of Palearctic Mice (Murinae)" (in en). Cytology and Genetics 57 (3): 213–220. doi:10.3103/S0095452723030076. ISSN 1934-9440. https://doi.org/10.3103/S0095452723030076. 

External links