

Ask HN: if DNA is the code, are proteins the processes? - niels_olson

I'm a physician, teaching myself python (hat tips to LPTHW, Codecademy, and Lutz). If DNA is the code. I'm guessing RNA is ... like the front-side bus and proteins are the running processes? Does that sound about right?
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vaxdigitalnh
What is the computer? The cell?

Python code is not DNA.

Even to say binary is DNA seems a stretch, and of course it's quaternary.

With cells, there is no single "front-side bus". There is Brownian motion,
geometry (e.g. at the level of DNA, A,T,C and G each have their own geometry),
collisions and a poorly understood process of geometrical "recognition". We
know how to build circuits and registers and construct computers from them,
but we don't understand how RNA builds up a cell from scratch. We can only
speculate that RNA can do this... the origin of life.

Perhaps Python would be a protein, but certainly not one that is required for
the cell to function. Some interesting exogenous protein perhaps. If you want
to control the essential "cellular proteins", the basic machinery of the cell,
e.g. the enzymes you allude to, then you need to learn assembly. Python, like
an exogenous protein, only acts to influence the machinery of the cell,
including the proteins within the cell: in the case of the computer, circuits,
registers and an assembly language.

Processes could be analagous cellular processes, i.e. what the proteins may
take part in, their various roles in the biochemical reactions that drive the
cell. Proteins are not the running processes, they are running the processes.

I think, with respect to coding, more important than the accuracy of the
metaphor is simply the skill of being able to think abstractly and derive
metaphors. So just the exercise of trying to come up with a comparison is
something a programmer would instinctually do.

All of our attempted comparisons are likely flawed in numerous ways. But it's
the exercise of making them that makes them worthwhile.

Good luck.

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RiderOfGiraffes
Why should there be any direct analog between "things" in the cell and
"things" in computing? Perhaps there is no real mapping between the two that
either makes sense, or is in any way useful.

Not to stop you from trying to find connections, but you seem to be certain
that there must be, and I was wondering why.

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niels_olson
Well, the deeper you get into cell bio, it's a huge amount of protein A
phosphorylates protein B phosphorylates protein C, cleaves protein D into D1
and D2, D2 phosphorylates ...

And it seems like there are some pretty basic verbs. I'm just playing around
with it all in my head, thought I'd ask the question.

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31reasons
The DNA is definitely the code but I think proteins are code,data and the
processor itself depending upon what role its playing in the cell. At
molecular level protein structures can affect creation or destruction of other
protein structures, they also act as logic-gates. So proteins are clearly part
of the cell hardware that regulates the cell. They also act as messages and
if-else control logic (its also called GNR, Gene Regulatory Network) to read
different DNA chunks based on certain conditions, so in that way they are part
of the code. So I think DNA is the code on the disk-drive but proteins is "in
memory" code,data and the hardware itself.

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dear
DNA is the class. Proteins are the instantiations.

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Mz
I don't really program. I know a little html and css. But I am guessing you
mean the folded proteins that the cell creates as tools? I am not sure that
most programmers necessarily know the direct connection between genes and
"proteins". I would think most people here view "protein" as a nutritious part
of their hamburger or building blocks for their own muscles. I only know that
"protein" can equal "important cellular process mechanism" because of my
genetic disorder, which miscodes a protein which handles traffic of specific
molecules into and out of the cell. I think even people with genetic disorders
frequently poorly understand that connection, though, as I understand, the
malfunction caused by most disorders is rooted in a missing or defective
protein. I happen to have thought a lot about the way my miscoded genes impact
cell function. That isn't the way most people frame things. So I think
relatively few people will see a connection between "protein" and "process".

So I will suggest that you might need to expand a little on the biological
half of your metaphor here before you get much useful feedback.

