GENETIC material is churned out in DNA factories anchored to cell membranes rather than by roving enzymes as previously supposed.
Before a cell divides, it replicates all its DNA so each daughter cell will inherit a copy of its genes. DNA polymerase, the complex of enzymes that copies DNA, was thought to travel along the double helix like a train on tracks.
But it was also possible that DNA polymerases stayed in one spot like a fixed DNA factory. "People have seen replication factories," says Alan Grossman of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "But they have never been able to tell whether they move."
To find out, Grossman and Katherine Lemon attached a green fluorescent protein from jellyfish to DNA polymerase in the bacterium
The polymerases replicated the bacterium's ...
To continue reading this article, subscribe to receive access to all of newscientist.com, including 20 years of archive content.