Codon Table
The standard codon table is given below.
UUU | F/Phe Phenylalanine | UCU | S/Ser Serine | UAU | Y/Tyr Tyrosine | UGU | C/Cys Cysteine | |
UUC | UCC | UAC | UGC | |||||
UUA | L/Leu Leucine | UCA | UAA | * Ochre Stop | UGA | * Opal Stop | ||
UUG | UCG | UAG | * Amber Stop | UGG | W/Trp Tryptophan | |||
CUU | CCU | P/Pro Proline | CAU | H/His Histidine | CGU | R/Arg Arginine | ||
CUC | CCC | CAC | CGC | |||||
CUA | CCA | CAA | Q/Gln Glutamine | CGA | ||||
CUG | CCG | CAG | CGG | |||||
AUU | I/Ile Isoleucine | ACU | T/Thr Threonine | AAU | N/Asn Asparagine | AGU | S/Ser Serine | |
AUC | ACC | AAC | AGC | |||||
AUA | ACA | AAA | K/Lys Lysine | AGA | R/Arg Arginine | |||
AUG | M/Met Methionine | ACG | AAG | AGG | ||||
GUU | V/Val Valine | GCU | A/Ala Alanine | GAU | D/Asp Aspartic acid | GGU | G/Gly Glycine | |
GUC | GCC | GAC | GGC | |||||
GUA | GCA | GAA | E/Glu Glutamic acid | GGA | ||||
GUG | GCG | GAG | GGG |
Cells are colored fro the amino acid from hydrophobic (blue) to hydrophilic (red) according to the order given in Lenstra 2015 and the HTML color code gradient (inverse HSV Gradient) was generated from http://www.perbang.dk/rgbgradient/.
DNA sequences are transcribed into mRNA by RNA polymerase II.
Codons that code for amino acids on the mRNA are recognized by tRNA's which are used by the Ribosome to produce polypeptides.
The codon table is not universal. However, variants are similar to the standard table with very few changes. Many of the known variants are mitochondrial which has a small genome and is possibly more likely to undergo stochastic codon changes.
Bacteria and phages can use alternative tables to defend against infection or to promote viral replication.
Release Factors
Stop codons are not recognized by tRNA's. Release Factors are proteins that recognize the stop codons.
In Prokaryotes Release Factor 1 (RF1) recognizes amber UAG and ochre UAA and RF2 recognizes ochre UAA and opal UGA.
Links
https://www.nature.com/scitable/blog/bio2.0/battle_of_the_genetic_codes
http://science.sciencemag.org/content/344/6186/909
http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2013/10/17/find-and-replace-across-an-entire-genome/
https://www.usnews.com/news/news/articles/2017-07-26/how-scientists-redesign-dna-codes