Long strands of repetitive DNA can be found at each end of a LTR retrotransposon. These are termed long terminal repeats (LTRs) that are each a few hundred base pairs long, hence retrotransposons with LTRs have the name long terminal repeat (LTR) retrotransposon. LTR retrotransposons are over 5 kilobases long. Between the long terminal repeats there are genes that can be transcribed equivalent to retrovirus genes gag and pol. These genes overlap so they encode a protease that processes the resulting transcript into functional gene products. Gag gene products associate with other retrotransposon transcripts to form virus-like particles. Pol gene products include enzymes reverse transcriptase, integrase and ribonuclease H domains. Reverse transcriptase carries out reverse transcription of retrotransposon DNA. Integrase integrates retrotransposon DNA into eukaryotic genome DNA. Ribonuclease cleaves phosphodiester bonds between RNA nucleotides.
LTR retrotransposons encode transcripts with tRNA binding sites so that they can undergo reverse transcription. The tRNA-bound RNA transcript binds to a genomic RNA sequence. Template strand of retrotransposon DNA can hence be synthesised. Ribonuclease H domains degrade eukaryotic genomic RNA to give adenine- and guanine-rich DNA sequences that flag where the complementary noncoding strand has to be synthesised. Integrase then integrates the retrotransposon into eukaryotic DNA using the hydroxyl group at the start of retrotransposon DNA. This results in a retrotransposon flagged by long terminal repeats at its ends. Because the retrotransposon contains eukaryotic genome information it can insert copies of itself into other genomic locations within a eukaryotic cell.