Chemists expand genetic code of E. coli to produce 21st amino acid, giving it new abilities – Phys.org

Rice University chemist Han Xiao and his team have successfully expanded the genetic code of Escherichia coli bacteria to produce a synthetic building block, a “noncanonical amino acid.” The result is a living indicator for oxidative stress.
The work, they say, is a step toward technologies that will allow the generation of novel proteins and organisms with a variety of useful functions.
Their study appears in the Cell Press journal Chem.
Amino acids are the building blocks of DNA. In general…

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