LLight
Member
- Joined
- May 30, 2018
- Messages
- 1,411
DNA may not be life's instruction book—just a jumbled list of ingredients
The common view of heredity is that all information passed down from one generation to the next is stored in an organism's DNA. But Antony Jose, associate professor of cell biology and molecular genetics at the University of Maryland, disagrees.
In two new papers, Jose argues that DNA is just the ingredient list, not the set of instructions used to build and maintain a living organism. The instructions, he says, are much more complicated, and they're stored in the molecules that regulate a cell's DNA and other functioning systems.
Jose outlined a new theoretical framework for heredity, which was developed through 20 years of research on genetics and epigenetics, in peer-reviewed papers in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface and the journal BioEssays. Both papers were published on April 22, 2020.
Jose's argument suggests that scientists may be overlooking important avenues for studying and treating hereditary diseases, and current beliefs about evolution may be overly focused on the role of the genome, which contains all of an organism's DNA.
"DNA cannot be seen as the 'blueprint' for life," Jose said. "It is at best an overlapping and potentially scrambled list of ingredients that is used differently by different cells at different times."
In two new papers, Jose argues that DNA is just the ingredient list, not the set of instructions used to build and maintain a living organism. The instructions, he says, are much more complicated, and they're stored in the molecules that regulate a cell's DNA and other functioning systems.
Jose outlined a new theoretical framework for heredity, which was developed through 20 years of research on genetics and epigenetics, in peer-reviewed papers in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface and the journal BioEssays. Both papers were published on April 22, 2020.
Jose's argument suggests that scientists may be overlooking important avenues for studying and treating hereditary diseases, and current beliefs about evolution may be overly focused on the role of the genome, which contains all of an organism's DNA.
"DNA cannot be seen as the 'blueprint' for life," Jose said. "It is at best an overlapping and potentially scrambled list of ingredients that is used differently by different cells at different times."
