Genomics Intelligent Design

Forthcoming book: “RNA is the cornerstone of cell biology”

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RNA, the Epicenter of Genetic Information book cover

RNA, the Epicenter of Genetic Information by John Mattock and Paulo Amaral, from CRC Press/Taylor and Routledge:

Book Description The origin story and emergence of molecular biology is muddled. The early triumphs in bacterial genetics and the complexity of animal and plant genomes complicate an intricate history. This book documents the many advances, as well as the prejudices and founder fallacies. It highlights the premature relegation of RNA to simply an intermediate between gene and protein, the underestimation of the amount of information required to program the development of multicellular organisms, and the dawning realization that RNA is the cornerstone of cell biology, development, brain function and probably evolution itself. Key personalities, their hubris as well as prescient predictions are richly illustrated with quotes, archival material, photographs, diagrams and references to bring the people, ideas and discoveries to life, from the conceptual cradles of molecular biology to the current revolution in the understanding of genetic information.

Key Features

Documents the confused early history of DNA, RNA and proteins – a transformative history of molecular biology like no other.

Integrates the influences of biochemistry and genetics on the landscape of molecular biology.

Chronicles the important discoveries, preconceptions and misconceptions that retarded or misdirected progress.

Highlights major pioneers and contributors to molecular biology, with a focus on RNA and noncoding DNA.

Dramatically glowing reviews include:

“This book is really disruptive and presents a coherent view of our understanding of biology in terms of the genetic molecules, the nucleic acids, DNA and RNA. It covers an immense territory of molecular biology and its history of discoveries, all presented with a clear-cut intellectual thread.

… It is very timely by its breadth and emphasis on the role of RNA in biology. It makes a strong case for RNA and its late acceptance… the fight uphill, like that of Sisyphus, was tough and demanded a lot of perseverance. It is really rather complete.”

Eric Westhof, University of Strasbourg

Remember the people who used to say, of their DNA, “This is me”? Didn’t wear well, that.

6 Replies to “Forthcoming book: “RNA is the cornerstone of cell biology””

  1. 1
    martin_r says:
    March 31, 2022 at 3:02 am

    off topic

    THE WATER PARADOX (a 2020 paper)

    But many scientists today say there’s a fundamental problem with that idea: life’s cornerstone molecules break down in water. This is
    because proteins, and nucleic acids such as
    DNA and RNA, are vulnerable at their joints.
    Proteins are made of chains of amino acids,
    and nucleic acids are chains of nucleotides.
    If the chains are placed in water, it attacks the
    links and eventually breaks them. In carbon
    chemistry, “water is an enemy to be excluded
    as rigorously as possible”    , wrote the late biochemist Robert Shapiro in his totemic 1986
    book Origins, which critiqued the primordial ocean hypothesis
    .
    This is the water paradox

    https://media.nature.com/original/magazine-assets/d41586-020-03461-4/d41586-020-03461-4.pdf

    PS: RNA world, just another miracle among many other miracles Darwinists have to believe in …

  2. 2
    bornagain77 says:
    March 31, 2022 at 4:01 am

    Life What A Concept! – Robert Shapiro – video
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=ku9wUbbPVYg#!

    quote from preceding video

    “I looked at the papers published on the origin of life and decided that it was absurd that the thought of nature of its own volition putting together a DNA or an RNA molecule was unbelievable.
    I’m always running out of metaphors to try and explain what the difficulty is. But suppose you took Scrabble sets, or any word game sets, blocks with letters, containing every language on Earth, and you heap them together and you then took a scoop and you scooped into that heap, and you flung it out on the lawn there, and the letters fell into a line which contained the words “To be or not to be, that is the question,” that is roughly the odds of an RNA molecule, given no feedback — and there would be no feedback, because it wouldn’t be functional until it attained a certain length and could copy itself — appearing on the Earth.”
    The late Robert Shapiro (1935-2011) was professor emeritus of chemistry at New York University. He is best known for his work on the origin of life, having written two books on the topic:

    Or to put it more bluntly, “The RNA world hypothesis: the worst theory for the early evolution of life (except for all the others)”

    The RNA world hypothesis: the worst theory for the early evolution of life (except for all the others) – July 2012
    Excerpt: “The RNA World scenario is bad as a scientific hypothesis” – Eugene Koonin
    “The RNA world hypothesis has been reduced by ritual abuse to something like a creationist mantra” – Charles Kurland
    “I view it as little more than a popular fantasy.” – Charles Carter
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3495036/

    A couple of more notes:

    RNA world: Chemists Propose a Seemingly Unlikely Environment for the Origin of Life – February 27, 2013
    Excerpt: Benner and his colleagues consider three major problems with the RNA-world model:
    *The “asphalt problem”: Organic reactions often produce unreactive byproducts. These byproducts are a mixture of pieces of the product or polymerization of the product, but are chemically insignificant and otherwise unpromising. Hence the metaphor of “asphalt.” Typically, avoiding the production of such byproducts requires very specific and controlled conditions, or post-reaction purification steps.
    *The “water problem”: Many of the bonds in RNA will undergo hydrolysis. This occurs when water reacts with the bond, causing it to break apart. In a lab, the problem is easily addressed by using a different solvent. However, the environment of the early Earth could not draw on the resource of various organic solvents.
    *The “impossible bond problem”: The authors refer here to the difficulty in forming certain bonds in RNA. Usually this follows from thermodynamic issues that prohibit bonds from spontaneously forming.
    Conspicuously missing from the authors’ list of critiques are the “chirality problem” and the “information problem.” Later in the paper, however, they concede that their model does not solve the enigma of chirality, and they allude to a potential “fatal flaw” in their proposition, namely that the kinds of RNA molecules that catalyze the destruction of RNA are more likely to emerge than RNA molecules that catalyze the synthesis of RNA. –
    http://www.evolutionnews.org/2.....68661.html?

    (July 2019) “We have no idea how to put this structure (a simple cell) together.,, So, not only do we not know how to make the basic components, we do not know how to build the structure even if we were given the basic components. So the gedanken (thought) experiment is this. Even if I gave you all the components. Even if I gave you all the amino acids. All the protein structures from those amino acids that you wanted. All the lipids in the purity that you wanted. The DNA. The RNA. Even in the sequence you wanted. I’ve even given you the code. And all the nucleic acids. So now I say, “Can you now assemble a cell, not in a prebiotic cesspool but in your nice laboratory?”. And the answer is a resounding NO! And if anybody claims otherwise they do not know this area (of research).”
    – James Tour: The Origin of Life Has Not Been Explained – 4:20 minute mark (The more we know, the worse the problem gets for materialists)
    https://youtu.be/r4sP1E1Jd_Y?t=255
    Dr. James Tour has been honored as one of the top synthetic Chemists in the world.

    Dr. James Tour – (Problems with) Abiogenesis Theory – (9 hour lecture series) – video
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKLgQzWhO4Q
    0:00 Reasons for this Series
    26:39 Episode 1 – Introduction to Abiogenesis
    50:45 Epsode 2 – Primordial Soup
    1:03:53 Episode 3 – Hype
    1:53:25 Episode 4 – Homochirality
    2:19:51 Episode 5 – Carbohydrates
    3:05:17 Episode 6 – The Building Blocks of the Building Blocks
    3:22:20 Episode 7 – Peptides
    4:14:08 Episode 8 – Nucleotides, DNA, and RNA
    5:05:57 Episode 9 – Intermediate Summary
    5:15:37 Episode 10 – Lipids and the Cell Membrane
    6:01:00 Episode 11 – Chiral-induced Spin Selectivity
    6:33:12 Episode 12.1 – Cell Construction and the Assembly Problem
    7:46:54 Episode 12.2 – Cell Construction and the Assembly Problem
    8:34:55 Episode 13 – Summary & Projections

  3. 3
    martin_r says:
    March 31, 2022 at 12:18 pm

    BA77
    thanks for the Robert Shapiro video, especially the part commenting on Miller-Urey experiment… was funny … here is it:

    https://youtu.be/ku9wUbbPVYg?t=140

  4. 4
    Lieutenant Commander Data says:
    March 31, 2022 at 1:20 pm

    As Genetics advance the Origin of life from mud , soup or any other materialist method is moving further away. 😆
    “At a recent meeting in Chicago, a highly distinguished international panel of experts was polled. All considered the experimental production of life in the laboratory imminent, and one maintained that this has already been done-his opinion was not based on a disagreement about the facts but on a definition as to just where, in a continuous sequence, life can be said to begin.” (George Gaylord Simpson [Professor of Vertebrate Paleontology, Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University], “The World into Which Darwin Led Us,” Science, Vol. 131 (3405): 966-974 (April 1, 1960).

    This statement was made 60 years ago; such a statement would definitely not be made today, as nothing close to life has ever been produced in the laboratory.

    The materialist hypothesis of the Origin of life being not proved scientifically is accepted BY FAITH and is the official dogma in scientific world. Who would think that is possible that an unproved fact to be imposed as truth in science?

    Same thing with darwinism . People study already created forms of life and genomes and have no clue about total complexity in a simple bacteria otherwise WHY would perform experiments over experiments anymore? Because they can’t break the intrinsic code of life and don’t have the full understanding of life.

  5. 5
    martin_r says:
    March 31, 2022 at 3:00 pm

    LCD

    This statement was made 60 years ago; such a statement would definitely not be made today, as nothing close to life has ever been produced in the laboratory.

    You are definitely wrong. Never underestimate a Darwinist.

    A very similar statement was made in 2014.

    Here you go:

    Jack Szostak, (Harvard, Nobel laureate) a famous OOL researcher in a 2014 interview announced he’d have “Life in the lab in 3-5 years, more likely in 3 years” :)))))))

    It is 2022, and what he got ? Nothing. Dreams and fantasies. :))))

    the full 2014 interview with Szostak:

    https://www.huffpost.com/entry/jack-szostak-life-in-the-lab_b_5540478

    PS: In that interview, Szostak is mentioning the same what i posted above, the water paradox

    The problem is RNA falls apart. The activated nucleotides we use to do the non-enzymatic replication — they react with water, so they fall apart.

  6. 6
    Lieutenant Commander Data says:
    March 31, 2022 at 3:29 pm

    Szostak, (Harvard, Nobel laureate) a famous OOL researcher in a 2014 interview announced he’d have “Life in the lab in 3-5 years, more likely in 3 years” :)))))))

    🙂 Well I’m not wrong in 1960 they announced the life in lab is imminent. In 2014 they said 3-5 years. In 2050 they will say :in 50-60 years and so on. The time gap became bigger.
    Are they not ashamed to keep a belief that nobody proved as serious scientific argument ? This is not science is metaphysical materialism=religion.
    “Inanimate nature possesses no ability to exercise the foresight, choice contingency, integrative engineering intent, or metabolic motivation necessary for programming a triplet codon
    sign system.” (David L. Abel)

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