WIKIMEDIA, LUCASHARRRNA self-replication is a key part of the RNA world hypothesis, but generating ribozymes in the lab that can synthesize, replicate, and amplify functional RNA molecules with complex structures has proven difficult. Until now, the most successful variants of the class I RNA polymerase ribozyme have worked inefficiently even on their preferred template: short, simple RNA sequences with a high concentration of pyrimidines.
In a paper published today (August 15) in PNAS, scientists from the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California, report on their use of in vitro evolution to generate an improved polymerase ribozyme that can synthesize multiple functional, structured RNAs and amplify short RNA templates.
The research “has extended the capabilities of RNA to RNA polymerization in ways that have not been achieved before,” said Scott Silverman of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, who did not participate in the work. “It’s definitely a key advance in the field of understanding what RNA polymerase ribozymes can do, and it has pretty important implications for the RNA world theory,” he added.
Study coauthors Gerald Joyce and David Horning of Scripps began with a variant of the ...
