nitrogen base

nitrogen base or nitrogenous base

n.

A basic compound that contains nitrogen, such as a purine or pyrimidine.

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nitrogen base

One of the nitrogen-containing purines (adenine or guanine) or pyrimidines (cytosine, thymine, or uracil) found in the nucleic acids DNA and RNA. The bases may be attached to a sugar (deoxyribose in DNA, ribose in RNA) to form nucleosides.The addition of a phosphate to a nucleoside results in the formation of a nucleotide, which is the basic constituent of nucleic acids.