Everything about Thymine totally explained
» For the similarly-spelled vitamin compound, see Thiamine
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Thymine is one of the four bases in the
nucleic acid of
DNA that make up the letters ATGC. The others are
adenine,
guanine, and
cytosine. Thymine (T) always pairs with adenine. Thymine is also known as
5-methyluracil, a
pyrimidine nucleobase. As the name suggests, thymine may be derived by methylation of uracil at the 5th carbon. In
RNA, thymine is replaced with
uracil in most cases. In DNA, thymine(T) binds to
adenine (A) via two hydrogen bonds to assist in stabilizing the nucleic acid structures.
Thymine combined with
deoxyribose creates the
nucleoside deoxythymidine, which is synonymous with the term
thymidine. Thymidine can be phosphorylated with one, two, or three phosphoric acid groups, creating, respectively, TMP, TDP, or TTP (thymidine mono-, di-, or triphosphate).
One of the common mutations of DNA involves two adjacent thymines or cytosine, which, in presence of
ultraviolet light, may form
thymine dimers, causing "kinks" in the DNA molecule that inhibit normal function.
