WIKIMEDIA COMMONS, MIKE AND AMANDA KNOWLES
Biological systems are complicated. Though DNA may carry a simple sequence of base pairs, once this information is transcribed into RNA and translated into proteins, this simple sequence can give rise to numerous, often unpredictable convolutions. Contending with this unpredictability of RNA and protein structure, synthetic biologists can struggle to design precise biological systems with specific goals. But what if the system was constructed entirely of DNA?
In a study in Journal of Royal Society Interface published online last week, Harish Chandran of Duke University and colleagues use DNA’s simplicity and predictability to propose possible DNA nanostructures that mimic polymerases or restriction enzymes to carry out a variety of biological processes.
“It’s a theoretically neat demonstration that some important reactions could be possible using DNA’s ...
