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Instructions:

In preparation for Week 2’s lecture on “DNA Read, Write, and Edit," please review these materials:

  1. Lecture 2 slides as posted below.
  2. The associated papers that are referenced in those slides.

In addition, answer these questions in each faculty member’s section:

Homework Questions from Professor Jacobson: [Lecture 2 slides]

  1. Nature’s machinery for copying DNA is called polymerase. What is the error rate of polymerase? How does this compare to the length of the human genome. How does biology deal with that discrepancy?
  2. How many different ways are there to code (DNA nucleotide code) for an average human protein? In practice what are some of the reasons that all of these different codes don’t work to code for the protein of interest?

Homework Questions from Dr. LeProust: [Lecture 2 slides]

  1. What’s the most commonly used method for oligo synthesis currently?
  2. Why is it difficult to make oligos longer than 200nt via direct synthesis?
  3. Why can’t you make a 2000bp gene via direct oligo synthesis?

Homework Question from George Church: [Lecture 2 slides]

Choose ONE of the following three questions to answer; and please cite AI prompts or paper citations used, if any.

  1. [Using Google & Prof. Church’s slide #4] What are the 10 essential amino acids in all animals and how does this affect your view of the “Lysine Contingency”?
  2. [Given slides #2 & 4 (AA:NA and NA:NA codes)] What code would you suggest for AA:AA interactions?
  3. [(Advanced students)] Given the one paragraph abstracts for these real 2026 grant programs sketch a response to one of them or devise one of your own:

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