new form of DNA in living human cells
65 years have passed since
the molecular structure of DNA had been discovered, the double helix, a ladder-shaped structure elegantly twisted like a corkscrew that contains the genetic instructions of all living organisms, billions of instructions that accurately determine all the characteristics of our bodies .
What's new is that a team of Australian biologists has just identified a completely new type of DNA, a new structure resembling a knot tangled in the DNA of living human cells. The structure, called i-motif, consists of four strands of DNA whose strands are paired in a peculiar way.
Deep in the cells of our body lies our DNA. Our source code has 6 billion letters, where A, T, C and G, adenine, thymine, cytosine and guanine are repeated. Adenine usually binds to thymine, while cytosine binds to guanine, but this is not the case in i-motif.
in the new knot-shaped structure, the C-pairs are joined to other C-pairs instead of to G. That is, the cytosine binds with the cytosine instead of the guanine.
Scientists believe that the identification of i-motifs in living cells will help to understand the function of this new form of DNA and its potential impact on health or human diseases.
But without celebration, the discovery will pass to the analysis of the scientific community, which will validate or reject it, because, in previous occasions, other DNA structures have been found that have proven to be temporary.
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