Question

If you were to try and pair a thymine with a cytosine (a non Watson-Crick base pairing), then would you expect to see any stability with respect to the hydrogen bonding (assuming the geometrical configurations of both bases were favorable to each other)? If yes, then how many hydrogen bonds could form between these two bases?
A. No, hydrogen bonds cannot form between thymine and cytosine.
B. Yes, three hydrogen bonds could form between thymine and cytosine.
C. Yes, one hydrogen bond could form between thymine and cytosine.
D. Yes, two hydrogen bonds could form between thymine and cytosine.

Answer 1

Answer:

D. Yes, two hydrogen bonds could form between thymine and cytosine.

Explanation:

A hydrogen bond (often informally abbreviated H -bond) is a primarily electrostatic force of attraction between a hydrogen (H) atom which is covalently bound to a more electronegative atom or group, particularly the second-row elements nitrogen (N), oxygen (O), or fluorine (F)—the hydrogen bond donor (Dn)—and another electronegative atom bearing a lone pair of electrons—the hydrogen bond acceptor (Ac).

The formation of stable hydrogen bonds depends on the distance between two strands, the size of the bases and geometry of each base. Stable pairings occur between guanine and cytosine and between adenine and thymine (or adenine and uracil in RNA).

One hydrogen bond could form between the C4 carbonyl group on thymine (a hydrogen bond acceptor) and the C4 amino group on cytosine (a hydrogen bond donor). Another hydrogen bond could form between N3 of thymine (a hydrogen bond donor) and the N3 of cytosine (a hydrogen bond acceptor). Note that the C2 carbonyl groups found on both bases are both hydrogen bond acceptors and therefore a hydrogen bond cannot be formed between them.