Chemistry and Industry, November 6th, 1989
Patents and primordial soup
The Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded jointly last month to Thomas Cech at the University of Colorado, Boulder and Yale's Sidney Altman, for their independent discovery of catalytic RNA.
The biochemistry textbooks will need some revision. RNA, traditionally regarded as a passive genetic messenger, is now known to have catalytic properties once attributed only to proteins. Cech and Altman have demonstrated that RNA can cut and assemble itself, without the aid of an outside catalyst. This discovery will redefine the study of genetics and enzyme chemistry. It mi...
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