Michieletto Davide
School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Edinburgh, Peter Guthrie Tait Road, Edinburgh EH9 3FD, UK.
MRC Human Genetics Unit, Institute of Genetics and Cancer,University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh EH4 2XU, UK.
Nucleic Acids Res. 2025 Jan 11;53(2). doi: 10.1093/nar/gkae1206.
All life forms are miraculous, but some are more inexplicable than others. Trypanosomes are by far one of the most puzzling organisms on Earth: their mitochondrial genome, also called kinetoplast DNA (kDNA) forms an Olympic-ring-like network of interlinked DNA circles, challenging conventional paradigms in both biology and physics. In this review, I will discuss kDNA from the astonished perspective of a polymer physicist and tell a story of how a single sub-cellular structure from a blood-dwelling parasite is inspiring generations of polymer chemists and physicists to create new catenated materials.
所有生命形式都是神奇的，但有些比其他的更难以解释。锥虫是迄今为止地球上最令人费解的生物之一：它们的线粒体基因组，也称为动质体DNA（kDNA），形成了一个类似奥运五环的相互连接的DNA环网络，挑战了生物学和物理学中的传统范式。在这篇综述中，我将从聚合物物理学家惊讶的角度来讨论kDNA，并讲述一个故事，即一种来自血液寄生虫的单个亚细胞结构如何激励一代又一代的聚合物化学家和物理学家创造新的连环材料。
