Professor Vadim Backman; Professor Igal Szleifer; Luay Almassalha, Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Feinberg School of Medicine; Kyle MacQuarrie, professor of pediatric oncology, Feinberg School of Medicine
New research reveals the second language of the human genome - one not written in its chemical letters but in its physical shape.
Scientists have long thought of DNA as an instruction manual written in the four- chemical bases -- A, C, T, and G -- that make up the genetic code. The prevailing belief was that by decoding these sequences, we could unlock how cells and organisms fundamentally work. Now, research from Northwestern Engineering's Vadim Backman reveals a second "language" of life: the "geometric code" embedded in the genome's physical shape. Like a blueprint for making living microprocessors, the geometric code helps cells store and process information.
"Rather than a predetermined script based on fixed genetic instruction sets, we humans are living, breathing computational systems that have been evolving in complexity and power for millions of years," Backman said.
Backman is the Sachs Family Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Medicine at Northwestern's McCormick School of Engineering, where he directs the Center for Physical Genomics and Engineering. He also is an associate director of the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center at Northwestern University.
The study, led by Backman in collaboration with Igal Szleifer, Christina Enroth-Cugell Professor of Biomedical Engineering at the McCormick School of Engineering; Luay Almassalha, of the Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology within the Feinberg School of Medicine; and Kyle MacQuarrie, assistant professor of pediatrics within the department of hematology, oncology, and stem cell transplantation at Feinberg, titled "Geometrically Encoded Positioning of Introns, Intergenic Segments, and Exons in the Human Genome," published Oct. 27 in Advanced Science, decodes this language, showing how cells can perform computations through the physical shape of their genomes.