Question

The lagging strand is characterized by a series of short segments of DNA (Okazaki fragments) that will be joined together to form a finished lagging strand. The experiments that led to the discovery of Okazaki fragments gave evidence ________ ideas.

Answer 1

Question is incomplete. Complete question has been attached.

Answer:

A) DNA polymerase is a directional enzyme that synthesizes leading and lagging strands during replication.

Explanation:

DNA polymerase synthesizes the new DNA strand from the template strands. Both the strands in a DNA molecule act as templates, however both of them have different orientation. It was observed that 3'-5' template DNA produced a new DNA strand continuously in one step. However, 5'-3' template produced new DNA strand in fragments which were joined together later. This observation gave the idea that DNA polymerase is a directional enzyme. It synthesizes DNA in 5'-3' direction so 3'-5' template gave rise to a continuous DNA segment. However, for 5'-3' template, DNA polymerase had to synthesize in opposite direction i.e. 3'-5' which was not possible directly. So the enzyme replicates it in short separate fragments which are later joined by DNA ligase.