Question

Bacteriophage is made up of
A. Carbon and nitrogen
B. DNA
C. Nucleoprotein (Nucleic acid + protein)
D. Protein only

Answer 1

Hint:- A bacteriophage is a virus that infects and replicates within bacteria. It is also referred to as the phage. It replicates within the bacterium after injecting its genome into the bacterial cytoplasm. Examples are my phages, lambda phages, filamentous and spherical phages.

Complete Answer:- Bacteriophages are composed of proteins which encapsulate the DNA or RNA genome. Morphologically, phages have the nucleic acid enclosed in a proteinaceous capsid/coat which is made up of nucleoproteins. It has a head composed of protein, inner core of nucleic acid and a hollow protein tail.
The capsid of a bacteriophage can have icosahedral, filamentous or head-tail shape. The head-tail structure is unique to phages. However, it appears as a tadpole structure with DNA inside the proteinous head.
It attaches itself to a bacterium and infects it. The bacteriophage then hijacks the bacterium's cellular machinery and prevents it from producing bacterial components and forces the cell to produce viral components instead. Therefore, new bacteriophages are produced and then burst out of the bacterium by a process called lysis. Bacteriophages destroy the bacteria by lysis or dissolution.
Thus, the correct answer is option C.

Note:- The bacteriophages use two different cycles to infect their bacterial hosts as follows:
The lytic cycle: The bacteriophage infects a bacteria, hijacks it to produce more phages and then eventually kills the bacteria leading to the release of the bacteriophages produced.
The lysogenic cycle: The bacteriophage infects a bacteria and inserts its DNA into the bacterial chromosome, allowing the phage DNA (prophage) to be replicated further and passed on along with the cell's own DNA In the future generations.