
New DNA structure inside human cells known as the “i-motif” has been identified - mudil
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/dna-new-discovered-human-cells-living-imotif-australia-research-double-helix-knot-a8318116.html
======
phobius
so many of the misleading headlines on this topic could be fixed by saying
"confirmed" instead of "discovered", or "identified"

~~~
epistasis
Yes, the real discovery is the detection technology.

So much of molecular biology and computational biology is tool building, so
that one can see things that were not visible before. As Feynman said nearly
60 years ago:

>We have friends in other fields – in biology, for instance. We physicists
often look at them and say, "You know the reason you fellows are making so
little progress?" (Actually I don't know any field where they are making more
rapid progress than they are in biology today.) "You should use more
mathematics, like we do." They could answer us – but they're polite, so I'll
answer for them: "What you should do in order for us to make more rapid
progress is to make the electron microscope 100 times better."

[http://www.zyvex.com/nanotech/feynman.html](http://www.zyvex.com/nanotech/feynman.html)

Single-cell sequencing, ATAC-seq, HI-C, ChIP-seq, and all the other new
technologies or old technologies like the antibody in this paper, these are
all attempts at getting towards that 100x better electron microscope.

~~~
phobius
really insightful response, thanks!

(aside: wow, Feynman really is the gift that keeps on giving...)

------
throwwit
Seems more like a ~pantry~ for DNA synthesis than anything functional,
especially given its four strands make for difficult reaction kinetics.

------
dosycorp
Maybe imotif acts similarly to proteins.

~~~
lokopodium
Proteins vary wildly in structure, size and chemistry, these things seem to be
rather similar so far chemically "boring".

~~~
dosycorp
Ha. Short strings of DNA, "chemically boring". Nothing to see here. Probably
just junk.

~~~
lokopodium
Compared to proteins (20+ amino acids, inclusions of non-aminoacid structures
such as heme), yes, quite boring.

~~~
dosycorp
But folding now. Interesting. We don't know what will happen. You should keep
an open mind.

~~~
DrScump
Few things can "open one's mind" like an angry prion.

~~~
dosycorp
Ha. I'd actually laugh if it wasnt so tragic.

------
epistasis
The actual article is here:
[https://www.nature.com/articles/s41557-018-0046-3](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41557-018-0046-3)

Supplementary material here:

[https://static-
content.springer.com/esm/art%3A10.1038%2Fs415...](https://static-
content.springer.com/esm/art%3A10.1038%2Fs41557-018-0046-3/MediaObjects/41557_2018_46_MOESM1_ESM.pdf)

