Protein molecular evolution potentials

Schneider, G., Schuchhardt, J., and Wrede, P. (1994). Artificial neural networks and simulated molecular evolution are potential tools for sequence-oriented protein design. Comput Appl Biosci 10,635-45. 

Many characteristics of hyaluronan are wonderful inventions of evolution. Such an evolutional definition could obviously be attributed to other biopolymers such as proteins, nucleic acids and polysaccharides. Indeed, evolutional potential, mostly related to biopolymers, strongly depends on molecular physico-chemical nature [1]. HA is considered one of the earliest evolutional forms of the polysaccharide family. So, let s look at hyaluronan s biological role in comparison with the molecular evolutions of other biopolymers. 

Molecular structures do not redraw the Darwinian tree of evolution but rather the clonal distribution of the Genomic Potential Hypothesis, and that forces us to realize that the model of descent with variation cannot be correct. Instead one observes clusters within clusters, both, in taxon development and molecular sequence similarity. One sees parallel world lines of proteins and species evolving as if from nothing, at different levels in antiquity, ending in extinction or breaking the surface to the present. 

RNA has three basic roles in the cell. First, it serves as the intermediate in the flow of information from DNA to protein, the primary functional molecules of the cell. The DNA is copied, or transcribed, into messenger RNA (mRNA), and the mRNA is translated into protein. Second, RNA molecules serve as adaptors that translate the information in the nucleic acid sequence of mRNA into information designating the sequence of constituents that make up a protein. Finally, RNA molecules are important functional components of the molecular machinery, called ribosomes, that carries out the translation process. As will be discussed in Chapter 2, the unique position of RNA between the storage of genetic information in DNA and the functional expression of this information as protein as well as its potential to combine genetic and catalytic capabilities are indications that RNA played an important role in the evolution of life. 

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