Nucleoside Analogs

Nucleosides are important biological molecules that function as signaling molecules and as precursors to nucleotides needed for DNA and RNA synthesis. Nucleosides are glycosylamines that can be thought of as nucleotides without a phosphate group. A nucleoside consists simply of a nucleobase (also termed a nitrogenous base) and a five-carbon sugar (either ribose or deoxyribose). Examples of nucleosides include cytidine, uridine, adenosine, guanosine, thymidine and inosine.