This post is coming a day late. I hope that’s not a problem with the rules of the A to Z Challenge! You see, I have some foreign DNA in my body. The common cold. I was too tired to get the video and post up last night. But here it is now! For the letter D, I’m talking about DNA. How many of these facts did you know?
And here are the facts:
- DNA stands for deoxyribonucleic acid.
- A DNA molecule is made up of two bipolymer strands wrapped around each other to form a double helix.
- There are four nucleobases represented by the letters C, G, A, and T. They are cytosine, guanine, adenine, and thymine.
- Nucleobases pair up, A with T and C with G to connect the two DNA strands to form the double helix.
- Only 2% of human DNA codes protein sequences. The remaining 98% have other various functions, which would require another full video to talk about.
- The species with the largest number of chromosomes is the ciliated protozoa with 29,640,000.
- The species with the fewest number of chromosomes is the jack jumper ant with only 2. But that’s for the females. Males are haploid and have only 1, the smallest number possible.
- Humans have 46 chromosomes, but other great apes, including chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans, have 48.
- More than 8% of the human genome is made up of retrovirus sequences.
- There is a 4% difference in the genomes of humans and our closest relatives, chimpanzees and bonobos.
Let me know in the comments section below what you knew.
I Read Encyclopedias for Fun 
I knew six of the ten facts about DNA. The one I find most interesting is how few chromosomes separate us from the apes. Nice video.
We aren’t actually separated from the apes, we are apes 🙂 But I know what you mean. Chimpanzees are our closest relatives. But they have 48 chromosomes, while we have 46. Sometime during human evolution, one of our ancestors had a fusion of a couple pairs of chromosomes. We know exactly where it happened.