Oops, thanks for the bits to bytes correction.
It is simply incredible to me that it could be so small (in an information sense).
This article (gzipped) is 22KB, more than 4 times as much information.
It is simply incredible to me that it could be so small (in an information sense).
This article (gzipped) is 22KB, more than 4 times as much information.
The genetic information is really the 4.8 kB of "code" PLUS the entire information already contained in the cellular hardware reading it. One doesn't make sense without the other.
At the very bottom, the whole thing depends on the laws of quantum mechanics in this universe, governing the minute details of molecular interaction. That, too, should be considered to go into the "code". Make a tiny change to the Plank constant, and the Zaire ebolavirus code will do something very different.
I liken DNA to a paper tape containing one of two punches: MAN or MOUSE. Feed it into a bio-replicator and get a man or a mouse. Does the paper tape define the man? Of course not.
I don't think that really captures it. Yes, it requires external machinery to actually do anything, but DNA is much more information dense and carries much more of an exact definition of the organism to be produced.
Personally, I prefer the analogy of compiler source code. Sure, it can't do anything on its own. But it defines how an working external system (another compiler or an functional cellular environment) can produce a second possibly different system
My understanding of biology is very limited. I've heard how physically small microbes are in every article out there. But never how information-small they are. Fascinating from a software developer's perspective.
I wonder what code golf for a virus would look like.
> Viroids are plant pathogens that consist of a short stretch (a few hundred nucleobases) of highly complementary, circular, single-stranded RNA. Viroid genomes are extremely small in size, ranging from 246 to 467 nucleotides (nt), and consisting of fewer than 10,000 atoms. In comparison, the genome of the smallest known viruses capable of causing an infection by themselves are around 2,000 nucleobases in size. The human pathogen hepatitis D virus is similar to viroids.
> Viroid RNA does not code for any protein. Their replication mechanism uses RNA polymerase II, a host cell enzyme normally associated with synthesis of messenger RNA from DNA, which instead catalyzes "rolling circle" synthesis of new RNA using the viroid's RNA as template. Some viroids are ribozymes, having catalytic properties which allow self-cleavage and ligation of unit-size genomes from larger replication intermediates.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viroid
In case you were wondering what a ribosyme is
> A ribozyme (ribonucleic acid enzyme) is an RNA molecule that is capable of catalyzing specific biochemical reactions, similar to the action of protein enzymes.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ribozyme
The action of ribozymes led to the RNA world hypothesis, as the mechanism for how you could have a simple system from which DNA and proteins can come as later optimizations on particular aspects. Some ribozymes are able to go as far as catalyze the building of their own RNA structure in the right environments (albeit, with limited success so far).
You hit near it when you gzipped the article -- consider a genome to be an incredibly compressed format, able to explode into a truly stunning amount of information, stored in a relative paucity of raw data.