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The replication fork is a structure that forms within the long helical DNA during DNA replication. It is produced by enzymes called helicases that break the hydrogen bonds that hold the DNA strands together in a helix.
The process of semiconservative replication for the site of DNA replication is a fork-like DNA structure, the replication fork, where the DNA helix is open, or unwound, exposing unpaired DNA nucleotides for recognition and base pairing for the incorporation of free nucleotides into double-stranded DNA. [3]
During DNA replication, the double helix is unwound and the complementary strands are separated by the enzyme DNA helicase, creating what is known as the DNA replication fork. Following this fork, DNA primase and DNA polymerase begin to act in order to create a new complementary strand.
The replicator is the entire DNA sequence (including, but not limited to the origin of replication) required to direct the initiation of DNA replication. The initiator is the protein that recognizes the replicator and activates replication initiation. [1]
The double-stranded structure of DNA provides a simple mechanism for DNA replication. Here, the two strands are separated and then each strand's complementary DNA sequence is recreated by an enzyme called DNA polymerase. This enzyme makes the complementary strand by finding the correct base through complementary base pairing and bonding it onto ...
DNA is a duplex formed by two anti-parallel strands. Following Meselson-Stahl, the process of DNA replication is semi-conservative, whereby during replication the original DNA duplex is separated into two daughter strands (referred to as the leading and lagging strand templates). Each daughter strand becomes part of a new DNA duplex.
Loading of these factors completes the active replication fork and initiates synthesis of new DNA. Complete replication fork assembly and activation only occurs on a small subset of replication origins. All eukaryotes possess many more replication origins than strictly needed during one cycle of DNA replication. [5]
These sequences allow the two replication forks to pass through in only one direction, but not the other. DNA replication initially produces two catenated or linked circular DNA duplexes, each comprising one parental strand and one newly synthesised strand (by nature of semiconservative replication). This catenation can be visualised as two ...