eddy@boulder.Colorado.EDU (Sean Eddy) (10/17/87)
The 30 September issue of Nature includes a report by
Makino et. al. of the cloning and sequencing of human
hepatitis delta virus. The three page paper details the
nucleotide sequence of this virus and then deduces the
open reading frames of the viral genome, and then concludes
with this shocking paragraph:
"One of the most interesting implications of the human HDV
RNA sequence is the presence of ORFs in both orientations.
If these ORFs are indeed used for the translation of proteins,
HDV RNA would represent the first instance of a single-stranded
RNA with bidirectional translation."
One can only hope that they meant something else...
- Sean Eddy
- MCD Biology; U. of Colorado at Boulder; Boulder CO 80309
- eddy@boulder.colorado.EDU !{hao,nbires}!boulder!eddy
-
- "A lack of unity and coherence [in a scientist's world view] frequently
- results in anxiety and schizophrenia." - Francois Jacob