Suppose you are provided with an actively dividing culture of E. coli bacteria to which radioactive thymine has been added. What would happen if a cell replicates once in the presence of this radioactive base? a. One of the daughter cells, but not the other, would have radioactive DNA. b. Neither of the two daughter cells would be radioactive. c. All four bases of the DNA would be radioactive. d. DNA in both daughter cells would be radioactive.

Question

Allison Randolph

Biology

1 May, 21:03

Suppose you are provided with an actively dividing culture of E. coli bacteria to which radioactive thymine has been added. What would happen if a cell replicates once in the presence of this radioactive base? a. One of the daughter cells, but not the other, would have radioactive DNA. b. Neither of the two daughter cells would be radioactive. c. All four bases of the DNA would be radioactive. d. DNA in both daughter cells would be radioactive.

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Answers (1)

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Cayden Schroeder · Answer 1

D. DNA in both daughter cells would be radioactive.

Explanation:

DNA replication is a semiconservative process in which each parental strand serves as a template for the synthesis of a new complementary daughter strand. The central enzyme involved is DNA polymerase, which catalyzes the joining of deoxyribonucleoside 5′-triphosphates (dNTPs) to form the growing DNA chain.