Pioneering research gives fresh insight into one of the pivotal building blocks of life. The quest to better understand how genomic information is read has taken a new step forward, thanks to pioneering new research.
A team of scientists, led by Dr Steven West at the University of Exeter's Living Systems Institute, have revealed a fresh insight into how genes are copied.
The human genome - or the entire set of DNA - comprises of thousands of genes. These units of information are copied into a messenger molecule, called RNA, by a complicated process known as 'transcription'.
Crucially, in order for this process to be carried out safely to the host organism, it is vital to start and stop in the correct place or else the message - in this case the RNA transcript - may make no sense or even cause harm.
For the process, a factory molecule called RNA polymerase attaches to DNA at the beginning of a gene, copies the information in the gene into an RNA molecule, before finally terminating the transcription process at the end of a gene.
