An article in New Scientist (May 16, p32) describes a radical alternate base pairing for CG and AT, which would if correct lead to a quite different DNA structure. The proponent of this theory (Mark Curtis, an artist) came to his conclusions on geometric grounds. Energetic grounds were not considered. For my evaluation of this theory, see http://www.ch.ic.ac.uk/newscientist/curtis/ The alternate AT pairing seems not that unreasonable, but the alternate CG pairing seems unlikely. Comments anyone? It will be interesting to see what, if any, science emerges in any subsequent New Scientist debate! I did send them a letter, but suspect they will consider it a "bit too technical" to publish. Shame that the New Scientist, despite my pleadings over the years, has always considered Chime models "too complicated" to put on their Web page. Any yet their own diagrams (p 34) obscure a vital aspect of the new base pairing, no doubt in the interests of "not making it too complicated for the reader". Henry Rzepa. +44 171 594 5774 (Office) +44 171 594 5804 (Fax) http://www.ch.ic.ac.uk/rzepa/ chemweb: A list for Chemical Applications of the Internet. To post to list: mailto:chemweb@ic.ac.uk Archived as: http://www.lists.ic.ac.uk/hypermail/chemweb/ To (un)subscribe, mailto:majordomo@ic.ac.uk the following message; (un)subscribe chemweb List coordinator, Henry Rzepa (mailto:rzepa@ic.ac.uk)