4 ms·
> certain DNA bases can shape-shift for a thousandth of a second, transiently morphing into alternative states that can allow the replication machinery to incor
by eggie 9y ago
> certain DNA bases can shape-shift for a thousandth of a second, transiently morphing into alternative states that can allow the replication machinery to incorporate the wrong base pairs into its double helix
I find this fascinating. I had always assumed that it was the shapeshifting of the polymerase that caused replication errors. Clearly that's not the whole story!
- ABCLAW 9y agoWe already know the polymerase error rate is the dominant factor - Comparison between various different polymerase error rates shows differences in error rates span across a 6-7 orders of magnitude. http://www.jbc.org/content/279/17/16895.full http://www.jbc.org/content/279/17/16895.full
- TuringTest 9y ago> certain DNA bases can shape-shift for a thousandth of a second, transiently morphing into alternative states that can allow the replication machinery to incorporate the wrong base pairs into its double helix Sounds like a race condition bug...