Scientists Discover a Bizarre New Way Life Can Make DNA… Without DNA

A molecular illustration of the crowded interior and cell envelope of Escherichia coli. (David S. Goodsell, The Scripps Research Institute) To replicate information, life usually has fairly straightforward ways of doing things. To copy DNA, you generally use DNA as a template. To make RNA, cells generally use DNA as a template, while RNA in turn provides the instructions for making proteins. But…