What are Nucleotides?
Nucleotides are non-protein nitrogen compounds in human milk and milk of other species. Thirteen acid-soluble nucleotides have been reported since nucleotides were first identified in human milk in 1960. They consist of a nitrogenous base, a five-carbon sugar (ribose or deoxyribose) and one to three phosphate groups. The nitrogen-containing bases are derivatives of two parent heterocyclic compounds, purines (adenine and guanine, mainly) and pyrimidines (cytosine, thymine and uracil, mainly). The ribo-nucleotides and deoxyribo-nucleotides serve as the monomeric precursor units of RNA and DNA respectively. Because nucleotides are the structural units of nucleic acids, RNA and DNA, and are essential compounds in the energy transfer systems (that is, in ATP and GTP), they have been assumed to play an important role in carbohydrate, lipid, protein and nucleic acid metabolism, and as modulators of many neonatal physiological functions.1 Proteases and nucleases degrade dietary nucleoproteins
