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News Feature
Nature 444, 259-261 (16 November 2006) | doi:10.1038/444259a; Published online 15 November 2006
Genetic information: Codes and enigmas
Helen Pearson1
- Helen Pearson is a reporter for Nature based in New York.
Abstract
There's more than one way to read a stretch of DNA, finds Helen Pearson — and we need to understand them all.
"Itwasknownthattheywerealittleacquaintedbutnotasyllableofreal
informationcouldemmaprocureastowhathetrulywas..." Reduce it to just a sequence of letters, and even a delicate phrase from Jane Austen's Emma becomes virtually impenetrable gobbledygook. So it was something of a triumph for Simon Shepherd when, in 2001, an algorithm he had written reconstructed all of Emma, word for separated word, from just such an uninterrupted string, despite being unacquainted with English vocabulary or syntax.
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