DNA
© Unknown
A team led by an Iranian scientist has made a breakthrough in DNA research that could answer some of our questions about how life first appeared on earth.

The Scripps Research team of scientists has created a new analog to DNA that assembles and disassembles itself without enzymes, Science Express reported in its latest issue.

The new information system could provide us with new windows to early life because it is made up of components that are what would logically be expected in a primitive world.

The team's achievement could also lead to the creation of new materials with the ability to fix or transform themselves, based on the surrounding environment.

One of the most prominent theories about the emergence of life is that before DNA, the earliest forms used RNA to transmit their genetic codes.

However, some scientists have challenged that theory because of the complexity of RNA, arguing that first life forms must have had a much simpler system.

"I have been working for years to learn what replicators and genetic systems might have come before the advent of the RNA world," Scripps Research chemist and team leader of the new project, Professor Reza Ghadiri said.

One of the qualities of DNA is its self-replicatory characteristics. Prior to the team's new findings the general conviction was that DNA could only assemble and disassemble itself with the help of cell enzymes.

The system constructed by Ghadiri's team, however, duplicates conditions similar to those that prevailed during the earth's younger days. DNA structures are made up of sugar-phosphate chains; the new system however is comprised only of amino acids.

In 1996, Ghadiri's team proved for the first time that amino acid strands, or peptides, could self-replicate under enzyme-free conditions, and now it has extended that work to present another type of system that might have the ability to evolve.

This work is a beginning step toward that goal," says Ghadiri, explaining what his team hopes to achieve in the long-term.