noun

• A nucleic acid molecule, or part of one, which replicates as a unit, beginning at a specific site within it.

  ‘Nuclei have numerous replicons origins per chromosome, which can be replicated simultaneously - so replication time is mechanistically independent of genome size and can be far less than in bacteria.’

  More example sentences

  • ‘This defective recovery of DNA replication suggests an inability to coordinate lesion bypass or to initiate new replicons.’
  • ‘An important category of small replicons are the prophages, phages and other virus types.’
  • ‘This small-scale patterning might result from different mutational biases on the leading and lagging strands, but only if replicon size in germ line cells were restricted to a few kilobases.’
  • ‘A characteristic feature of the cellular response to ionizing radiation exposure is inhibition of replicon initiation.’