My First Experience With Dna.....

" DNA - DNA is a genetic material and carries hereditary information from one generation to the next."

This is all I knew about DNA when I entered into college to pursue B.Sc. Biotechnology. My bubble has burst when my genetic engineering professor started discussing about DNA. He said, "DNA is deoxyribonucleic acid, it is a double helical structure coiled in right handed fashion. Two strands are known as polynucleotide having repeated units of nucleotides which only differ in base sequences. Nucleotides are joined with each other by phosphate bonds. The two polynucleotide chains are joined by hydrogen bonds formed between bases. Each nucleotide contains one of these following nitrogen containing bases i.e. adenine, guanine, thymine and cytosine. Sugar-phosphate backbone held both polynucleotide chain together."

How was it ? Confusing isn't it ?

In addition to this it is said that DNA is 2 meter long if it is stretched one cell all way out and 6 billion base pairs exist in a single cell and there are approximately 50 trillion cells in human body which works out to form 100 trillion meters of DNA in human.

All this is present in the cell which you cannot see with naked eyes. This is the way nature works. Far more than perfect.

Now, did your head start aching ? It's funny.

Then when I entered into lab, our first practical was to "Isolate DNA from plant tissue." After one hour of adding reagents, subjecting to centrifuge (it is a type of grinder which just rotates instead of grinding the material which is added), removing the supernatant layer then removing the remains, this continues for 1 hour. After that at the bottom of centrifuge tube a white pellet was observed then, our professor said "Students, this is DNA."

I was stunned and several questions were revolving in my mind "where is the polynucleotide chain, where are the bases, where is the backbone, where is the 2 meters long DNA, how one can be so sure this is the most important component of human body that is responsible for carrying genetic information."

And that I realized science can only be understood by scientists and researchers. For a normal human being it is just an illusion. We believe what is given in books researched by great scientist who spent their lives in labs.

And that day my concious said to me "Neegam Nain you can never become a researcher, never ever let this thought penetrate your mind even for once."

But jokes apart, each and every discovery involves dedication and persistence to work. It is not an easy task to study genomic material. But, science is crazy and it will spin your head.

Thank you for reading this.........