DNA

Common international abbreviation for the English term deoxyribonucleic acid. The German term DNS (deoxyribonucleic acid) is hardly used any more to avoid confusion with the Domain Name System (DNS) of the Internet. The structure of DNA was discovered in 1953 by biologists James Watson (*1928) and Francis Crick (1916-2004), who together with Maurice Wilkins (1916-2004) were awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1962.

The name is derived from the first letters of the basic DNA building blocks deoxyribose (a type of sugar consisting of five carbon atoms) and type of sugara pentose), phosphoric acid and four bases, which make up nucleic acid. DNA is a chain molecule in the cell nuclei of all plant, fungal, animal and human organisms, which serves as a carrier of genetic information for the maintenance of all biological life processes and is inherited. The genes are responsible for every single function in an organism, such as cell division or metabolism.

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DNA

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