Radioisotopes and Life Processes (Revised)

by Walter E. Kisieleski; Renato Baserga

DNA SYNTHESIS: THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF CELLS

Here, surely, is the prime substance of life itself.

Isaac Asimov

The many characteristic features of each living species, its complex architecture, its particular behavior patterns, the ingenious modifications of structure and function that enable it to compete and survive—all these must pass, figuratively speaking, through the eye of an ultramicroscopic needle before they are brought together as a new, individual organism. The thread that passes through the eye of this needle is a strand of the filamentous molecule, deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). Let us now outline the research that led to these conclusions.