Selected topics in molecular biology, in need of “hard” science

Abstract

The almost exclusive repository of the Information needed by all beings we know of, for birth, development, living, reproduction, and (most probably) setting their life-span, is DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid). Before reviewing how this information is organized, derived and expressed, we will first sketch the basic features of DNA: its chemical composition, its structures and structural flexibility, and the cooperativities which exist inside this macromolecule. In the second part, the salient basic features of the first two steps in gene expression, the transcription of the genetic message and the translation of the transcription product, will be summarized. These two parts are intended as an introduction to the two last parts of this contribution: control and regulation of gene expression, and protein folding, the third major step in gene expression. These two problems remain to date the major challenges in biology in general, and are badly in need of “hard” science.