title: The dimensions and shapes of the furanose rings in nucleic acids.
abstract: A survey was made of the geometry of furanose rings in beta-nucleotides and beta-nucleosides (as monomers related to nucleic acids) for which structures have been determined by X-ray crystallography. Mean values, and estimated standard deviations from them, were calculated for bond-lengths, bond-angles and conformation-angles. For parameters with values dependent on ring-puckering, separate calculations were made for each ring type. (The rings are puckered in one of three conformations: C-2- or C-3-endo or C-3-exo; C-2-exo has not been observed.) The results were used to compute standard furanose rings with C-2-endo, C-3-endo and C-3-exo conformations for use in nucleic acid molecular model-building. The survey also showed that the only other conformation-angle in nucleotides dependent on the furanose ring conformation corresponds to the relative orientation of the purine (or pyrimidine) base and the ring.
mesh_terms: D004247:DNA; D008961:Models, Structural; D009690:Nucleic Acid Conformation; D009705:Nucleosides; D009711:Nucleotides; D012313:RNA; D012266:Ribose; D014961:X-Ray Diffraction
chemical_list: D009705:Nucleosides; D009711:Nucleotides; D012313:RNA; D012266:Ribose; D004247:DNA