ANTHRO 101 Lecture Notes - Lecture 30: East Los Angeles College, Sister Chromatids, Dna Replication
Document Summary
The eukaryotic chromosome consists of a linear dna double helix bound to proteins. Each human chromosome contains a single dna double helix = 50-250 million nucleotides: can be up to 6 feet long! For most of cell"s life, the dna in each chromosome is wound around proteins called histones: this makes the dna more compact and shortened, look at diagram on page 149. Genes are segments of the dna of a chromosome. Genes are sequences of dna from hundreds to thousands of nucleotides long. Each gene occupies a specific place, or locus on the chromosome. Chromosomes vary in the number of genes they contain. The largest human chromosome, chromosome 1, contains over 3,000 genes, whereas one of the smallest human chromosomes, chromosome 22, has only 600 genes. Every chromosome has specialized regions that are crucial to its structure and function: two telomeres and one centromere.
