Scientists have identified QT45, a self-copying RNA molecule, adding weight to the idea that RNA may have been the first genetic material on Earth.
- QT45 is just 45 nucleotides long and can replicate itself under special conditions, using three-nucleotide building blocks.
- Its copying is very slow when compared with the machinery of modern cells.
- The finding backs the RNA World hypothesis, which holds that early life relied on RNA alone before DNA and proteins appeared.
- The 1953 Miller–Urey experiment had shown amino acids could form in early-Earth conditions, but it produced neither DNA nor RNA.