We can rebuild him! We have the technology.
This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science.
D-N-A is the molecular blueprint of life, so why not change it to our advantage? It’s as easy as…forcing two opposing magnets together. Huh… There must be a way.
Enter the Hocek lab from the Czech Academy of Sciences!
Connecting specific charged molecules to our D-N-A can give us bacterial and viral protection. It’s not a simple task: attaching these molecules together is like connecting those magnets. First, they attached charged molecules to D-N-A building blocks called nucleotides using string-like molecules. They can even attach these D-N-A building blocks together to create whole segments of modified D-N-A!
These segments of D-N-A have not been tested in our cells. But, this data seems to show that we can modify D-N-A like this. Who knows? Researchers might be able to treat diseases with it!
Goodbye sick days, hello SIX MILLION DOLLAR DAYS! Corny sound effects not included.
Reference: Kuprikova, N. M., Ondruš, M., Bednářová, L., Riopedre-Fernández, M., Slavětínská, L. P., Sýkorová, V., & Hocek, M. (2023). Superanionic DNA: enzymatic synthesis of hypermodified DNA bearing four different anionic substituents at all four nucleobases. Nucleic Acids Research. https://doi.org/10.1093/nar/gkad893