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All genetically relevant information contained in any nucleic acid molecule resides in its base sequence, so the prime role any mode of replication is to duplicate the base sequence of the parent molecule. The specificity of base pairing – Adenine with Thymine and Guanine with Cytosine – provide the mechanism used by all replication systems. Further more

1. Nucleotide monomers are added one by one to the end of a growing strand by an enzyme called a DNA polymerase.

2. The sequence of base in each new or daughter strand is complementary to the base sequence in the old or parent strand being copied – that is, if there is an adenine in the parent strand, a thymine will be added to the end of the growing daughter strand when the adenine is being copied.

In the following section we consider how the two strands of a daughter molecules are physically related to the two strands of the parent molecule.

Replication can be broadly defined as genome duplication, an essential process for the propagation of cellular genome and those of ‘Molecular parasites’ – Viruses, plasmids and transposable elements. The genome to be duplicated is the parental genome, and the copies are daughter genomes.

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