Jessica Bowman and Loren Williams, Georgia Institute of Technology (IMAGE)

Georgia Institute of Technology

Jessica Bowman and Loren Williams, Georgia Institute of Technology

Caption

Jessica Bowman (left) and Loren Williams from the Georgia Tech School of Chemistry and Biochemistry assess a gel showing that RNA is not degraded by iron if oxygen is omitted. Based on these results, Williams hypothesizes that RNA evolved on the early earth in the presence of iron and is optimized to work with iron.

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Georgia Tech/Gary Meek

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