Liquid Crystal Phases of DNA, Beginning of Life?

An anonymous reader writes "A team led by the University of Colorado at Boulder and the University of Milan has discovered some unexpected forms of liquid crystals of ultrashort DNA molecules immersed in water, providing a new scenario for a key step in the emergence of life on Earth. CU-Boulder physics Professor Noel Clark said the team found that surprisingly short segments of DNA, life's molecular carrier of genetic information, could assemble into several distinct liquid crystal phases that "self-orient" parallel to one another and stack into columns when placed in a water solution. Life is widely believed to have emerged as segments of DNA- or RNA-like molecules in a prebiotic "soup" solution of ancient organic molecules.

Comments

Re:Life?

[Kjella]

Obviously off on the religious mockery tangent, but this isn't really offtopic. If (I'd say when) we discover how to make life from inanimate matter, there's bound to be yet another clash between Genesis and Abiogenesis. And some people will yet again claim that the Book is right and science is wrong. Obviously religion gets a lot less personal if God is someone that once snapped his fingers and there was a Big Bang - and that everything that follows can be replicated in a test tube. But I think that we in the not too distant future will make the connection from inanimate molecules into primitive replicating beings. And if God doesn't smite us down at that point for invading his turf he never will.

Re:Life?

[foniksonik]

We're plenty intelligent enough... we just don't have enough data and probably never will, but we can make guesses - more educated guesses than those made by early philosophers (religious academics and natural academics). Personally I don't see the disconnect between early science/religion and modern science. They sought answers with what information they had available.. we do the same. Just because some cult of people want to believe that we were at the pinnacle of understanding some 2 - 3 thousand years ago, doesn't discount the efforts made at the time.

Those Rabbis, Greeks and monks were very smart people - they also had to deal with politics and ignorance however and sometimes the best way to deal with that is to dumb it down to a lowest common denominator. "That's right, God made that happen. Don't go to war over it... it was a miracle. Now give us money so we can keep teaching your kids how to read/write and count to ten."

not intelligent enough...

[CrazedWalrus]

...Or don't have the proper perspective. For example, consider one of those huge walk-through mazes. Those things are dog-simple when seen from above, but when you're inside of it, it can take an hour to get out. You do eventually get out, but it takes a lot longer to solve that way than the seconds it would take when seen from a better point of view.

I'm personally of the opinion that nothing science concludes will ever be able to prove or disprove the existence of (a) God(s), so I'm not sure why this discussion keeps coming up. Yeah, science never "proves", only "shows to be likely", whatever. The point is that you either believe in God or you don't. There's no scientifically veritable "correct" answer that can ever be had until some day in the future when it's too late to do anything about it anyway. You're either worm food or in your final eternal resting place... wherever that may be.

Honestly, the religion bashing is completely pointless and is getting really, really old hat.

Re:not intelligent enough...

[Daniel Dvorkin]

I'm personally of the opinion that nothing science concludes will ever be able to prove or disprove the existence of (a) God(s), so I'm not sure why this discussion keeps coming up.

It keeps coming up because religious ideologues keep insisting that science is wrong because it contradicts their beliefs. And they want to base public policy and education on those beliefs. The beliefs themselves are a personal matter, of course, and they've got every right to believe that Rapture is imminent or that life was created in its current form 6000 years ago; the conflict occurs when they try to base things like environmental management or what's taught in high-school science classes on it.

Honestly, the religion bashing is completely pointless and is getting really, really old hat.

The science bashing isn't pointless at all -- it's a means of gaining political power -- but it's definitely old hat, which doesn't keep fanatics from doing it. Scientists who bash religion, e.g. Dawkins, do so out of disgust with religion's continual insistence on trying to replace knowledge with ignorance, and the consequences thereof.

Re:not intelligent enough...

[Daniel Dvorkin]

However, religion bashing has come to a point where even admitting of being religious is a cause of ridicule or arrogance.

[shrug] I haven't seen that; I have seen a lot of religious believers being hypersensitive and interpreting fanatic-bashing as religion-bashing generally. E.g., when someone attempts to jump in on a discussion of the origins of DNA in the early terrestrial environment with, "That can't be true because Genesis says ..." then mockery is the only reasonable response. That's not religion-bashing, that's fanatic-bashing. If you are willing to accomodate your religious beliefs to scientific observations, as many religious scientists have done, then hardly anyone is going to attack you for it. (And those who do can be ignored; there are cranks and professional malcontents on both sides of every argument.)

I do science and I am religious. Is there something wrong in that?

Of course not. Motivation is irrelevant when science is done right. You can study a problem because you have a personal interest in solving it, because you want to unravel the mysteries of God's creation, because someone is paying you a whole lot of money to do so, or just out of simple curiosity -- all of these motivations can produce good science, and will no doubt continue to do so. But it's important to acknowledge that some motivations are more likely to lead to bias than others; and it is absurd to deny that religion has introduced considerable bias into the study of the origins of life.

God of the Gaps

[Liquidrage]

It's shrinking. One day they'll be no place to hide.