Abstract
A significant part of the genetic code likely originated via a chemical interaction, which should be experimentally verifiable. One possible verification relates bound amino acids (or perhaps their activated congeners) and ribonucleotide sequences within cognate RNA binding sites. To introduce this interaction, I first summarize how amino acids function as targets for RNA binding. Then the experimental method for selecting relevant RNA binding sites is characterized. The selection method’s characteristics are related to the investigation of the RNA binding site model treated at the outset. Finally, real binding sites from selection and also from extant natural RNAs (for example, the Sulfobacillus guanidinium riboswitch) are connected to the genetic code, and by extension, to the evolutionary progression that produced the code. During this process, peptides may have been produced directly on an instructive amino acid binding RNA (a DRT; Direct RNA Template). Combination of observed stereochemical selectivity with adaptation and co-evolutionary refinement is logically required, and also potentially sufficient, to create the striking order conserved throughout the present coding table.
Highlights
We test for unexpectedly frequent cognate coding triplets within, taking an essential role in, a specific set of RNA-amino acid binding sites
The ability of specific RNA folds to bind one or both amino acid domains will be a crucial point of discussion below
Related small sites conserve the L-Arg anticodon marked at the entry to the hairpin loop (Figure 3) in 94% of all sequences
Summary
Construction of the genetic code required specific interactions between amino acids and RNAs, acting alone, before peptides could be encoded. Close study of this molecular interaction, is one of the most promising routes we possess to the origin of the code and translation itself. We test for unexpectedly frequent cognate coding triplets within, taking an essential role in, a specific set of RNA-amino acid binding sites
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