Strange cousins: Molecular alternatives to DNA, RNA offer new insight into life’s origins

Scientists have been investigating properties of so-called Xenonucleic acids or XNA's. They have demonstrated for the first time that six of these unnatural nucleic acid polymers are capable of sharing information with DNA. One of these XNAs, a molecule referred to as anhydrohexitol nucleic acid or HNA was capable of undergoing directed evolution and folding into biologically useful forms.

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