Which term describes a codon that specifies the same amino acid as another codon?

• A. Anticodon
• B. Degenerate codon
• C. Codon table
• D. Nucleus

Answer: (B)

Redundancy in the genetic code allows several distinct codons to specify the same amino acid. This means codons that share the same amino acid are considered synonymous, reflecting the code’s degeneracy. The idea is that the genetic code isn’t one codon per amino acid, but several codons can map to the same amino acid, often differing in the third position due to wobble base pairing. An example is the set of codons GCU, GCC, GCA, and GCG, all of which encode the same amino acid, alanine. Because of this redundancy, each of those codons describes the same amino acid, which is captured by the term degenerate codon (or degeneracy of the genetic code). The other terms refer to different concepts: an anticodon is part of tRNA that pairs with a codon, the codon table is the map of codons to amino acids, and the nucleus is a cellular organelle where genetic material is stored.