this post was submitted on 30 Oct 2023
1419 points (95.9% liked)
Technology
59631 readers
2920 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related content.
- Be excellent to each another!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
Approved Bots
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I studied this stuff back in uni, is really fascinating, though, I'm more familiar with DNA amplification via Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR).
If you're interested, I'll give some details here and a link to a neat video. Effectively, there is an enzyme in our cells called DNA Polymerase. It literally scans a strand of DNA and copies it. In PCR, they use a solution of nucleotides (building blocks of DNA) and the DNA Polymerase extracted from a heat-loving microbe. The DNA to be copied (amplified) is added, and then the temperature maintained at the enzyme's optimal temperature (higher than usual for other organisms). The solution is allowed to "stew" for a set amount of time, then, filtered to separate the DNA (lots of copies of the original) from everything else.
A similar process can be done using an RNA polymerase (possibly modified) in order to amplify mRNA. So, once the template is printed, it gets put in the solution and RNA polymerases go brrrrrr.
https://youtu.be/wJyUtbn0O5Y?si=Gkz8B87iY-35GvuZ
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://piped.video/wJyUtbn0O5Y?si=Gkz8B87iY-35GvuZ
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
Very interesting dude, thanks for the write up and video!
You're very welcome!