The work of Kiwako Sakabe and Reiji Okazaki provided experimental evidence supporting the hypothesis that synthesis of one of the DNA strand occurs in discontinous fashion. Okazaki and colleagues suggested that there waws mechanism that showed continuous replication of DNA in the 3' to 5' direction. The DNA polymerase had only 5' to 3' activity. The Okazakis' experiments provided extensive information on the replication process of DNA and the existence of short, newly synthesized DNA chains (The lagging strand) that later became known as Okazaki fragments.

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