Scientists Synthesized A DNA-Like Molecular System To Search For Life On Other Worlds

In a research breakthrough by NASA,  scientists have created a DNA-like molecular system that can store and transmit information.

This unexceptional feat suggests there could be an alternative to DNA-based life on other worlds.

This new innovation suggests scientists searching for life beyond Earth may need to consider what they are looking for.

The DNA is a complex molecule of the deoxyribonucleic acids that stores and transmit genetic information, and it consists of four different chemical groups known as nucleotides.

"Life detection is an increasingly important goal of NASA's planetary science missions, and this new work will help us to develop effective instruments and experiments that will expand the scope of what we look for," said Lori Glaze, acting director of NASA's Planetary Science Division.

Presently, a team of researchers, led by Steven Benner at the Foundation for Applied Molecular Evolution in Alachua, Florida, created a new information molecular system that is like DNA, except in a particular area. The new molecule has eight different chemical groups instead of four.

The artificial DNA includes the four nucleotides present in Earth Life - adenine, cytosine, guanine and thymine - but also other four that looks like the structure of the informational ingredients contained in regular DNA. The out-come is a double helix structure that can store and transmit information.

Benner's team, which collaborated with laboratories at the University of Texas in Austin, Indiana University Medical School in Indianapolis, and DNA software in Ann Arbor, Michigan, called the innovation "hachimoji DNA (from the Japanese "hachi", meaning "eight", and "moji", meaning "letter").

The hachimoji DNA meets all the structural requirements that allow our DNA to store and transmit information in living systems.

"By carefully analysing the roles of shape, size and structure in hachimoji DNA, this work expands our understanding of the types of molecules that might store information in extraterrestrial life on alien worlds", said Benner.

The major goal of NASA is to search for life on other planets like Mars, where there was once flowing water and a thick atmosphere, or moons of the outer solar system like Europa and Enceladus, where large water oceans exist under thick layers of ice.