New Genetic Letters Augment DNA, and Soon Perhaps Life

摘要

The letters of DNA, along with their RNA cousins, write the code for all life as we know it. But perhaps not for long. At the ACS meeting, a pair of research groups reported that they now have alternative letters-synthetic nucleotides-that can be incorporated into DNA and can be copied with near perfection by enzymes that copy natural DNA. These additions to the genetic alphabet are already enabling researchers to write new chemical functions into DNA, which could help usher in a wide array of biotechnology advances. And they are a critical step along the way to making semisynthetic life forms, written in the first new type of genetic code that life has ever known.