Abstract
A correspondence between open reading frames in sense and antisense strands is expected from the hypothesis that the prototypic triplet code was of general form RNY, where R is a purine base, N is any base, and Y is a pyrimidine. A deficit of stop codons in the antisense strand (and thus long open reading frames) is predicted for organisms with high G + C percentages; however, two bacteria (Azotobacter vinelandii, Rhodobacter capsulatum) have larger average antisense strand open reading frames than predicted from (G + C)%. The similar Codon frequencies found in sense and antisense strands can be attributed to the wide distribution of inverted repeats (stem-loop potential) in natural DNA sequences.
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Forsdyke, D.R. Sense in antisense?. J Mol Evol 41, 582–586 (1995). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00175816
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00175816