Why Does DNA Contain Thymine and Not Uracil?

Why Does DNA Contain Thymine and Not Uracil?

Given that both uracil and thymine base-pair with adenine, why does RNA contain uracil and DNA contain thymine? Scientists now believe that RNA was the original hereditary molecule, and that DNA developed later. If we compare the structure of uracil and thymine, the only difference is the presence of a methyl group at C-5 of thymine. This group is not on the side of the molecule involved in base pairing. Because carbon sources and energy are required to methylate a molecule, there must be a reason for DNA developing with a base that does the same thing as uracil but that requires more energy to produce. The answer is that thymine helps guarantee replication fidelity. One of the most common spontaneous mutations of bases is the natural deamination of cytosine.

At any moment, a small but finite number of cytosines lose their amino groups to become uracil. Imagine that during repli-cation, a C–G base pair separates. If at that moment the C deami-nates to U, it would tend to base-pair to A instead of to G. If U were a natural base in DNA, the DNA polymerases would just line up an adenine across from the uracil, and there would be no way to know that the uracil was a mistake. This would lead to a much higher level of mutation during replication. Because uracil is an unnatural base in DNA, DNA polymerases can recognize it as a mistake and can replace it. Thus, the incorporation of thymine into DNA, though energetically more costly, helps ensure that the DNA is replicated faithfully.