Chemical Structure of RNA
Each nucleotide, or strand of RNA, is made up of a base (adenine, cytosine, guanine, and uracil, typically abbreviated as A, C, G and U), a ribose sugar, and a phosphate. RNA plays a central role in the pathway from DNA to proteins, known as the "Central Dogma" of molecular biology. An organism's genetic information is encoded as a linear sequence of bases in the cell's DNA. During the process known as transcription, a RNA copy of a segment of DNA, or messenger RNA (mRNA), is made. This strand of RNA can then be read by a ribosome to form a protein. RNA also plays an important role in protein synthesis.