What is meant by conservative vs. non-conservative amino acid Essay

What is meant by conservative vs. non-conservative amino acid substitutions in a protein, what are the possible implications of each, including a possible impact upon nutrition - Essay Example On the other hand a non conservative amino acid substitution brings about a change in the protein. There is a remarkable change in the position, shape and other attributes of the amino acid arrangement. Non Conservative amino acid substitutions result in changes in the protein which can be described as mutations. Occurrence of mutations may cause malfunctioning of the protein (Krawczak, 48). Many chemical changes cause damage to the DNA. There are different mutations that affect the functioning of the gene in different ways. Because of this abnormalities in body and blood function such as sickle cell anemia can be witnessed. Mutations can block protein synthesis, disrupt transcription and splicing, produce protein products that are truncated, and generally disrupt the functioning of proteins (Krawczak, 47). Mutations affect the functioning of red blood cells so that transportation of oxygen to the cell becomes very difficult. Body nutrition is therefore adversely affected (Chasman, 6 90). Chasman Dennis. and Adams Ramney. Predicting the functional consequences of non- synonymous single nucleotide polymorphisms: structure-based assessment of amino acid variation.  J. Mol. Biol.,307, 2001, 683–706. Krawczak Mariam., Ball Egler. Fenton Insar., Stenson Pardy, Abeysinghe Sam., Thomas Nick. and Cooper Dick. Human gene mutation database-a biomedical information and research resource.  Hum. Mutat.,  15, 2000,