The Trouble with Guanine

Dr. Azo Mazur
Fellow of the reDiscovery Institute

Reprinted from The reDiscovery Institute Proceedings, 2005


Scientists in the Design Movement have no doubt that the original optimal designs of life have been degraded. We believe that degradation of original designs has led to infectious disease, birth defects, cancer, and aging. Disease is not evidence of an unintelligent or malevolent designer. Disease is evidence that the original optimal designs have degenerated over time.

My esteemed colleague Stephen C. Meyer has noted that there is direct genetic evidence (i.e., scientific evidence) that one deadly disease (the plague) arose from evolutionary processes that altered an original design. He has proposed a specific pathway of degradation of an optimal design. He makes a compelling argument that one of the most important goals of current design scientists must be to infer flawless aboriginal designs and to determine the mechanisms and effects of subsequent decay.

Here we take up Mr. Meyer's challenges. We identify the single biggest mistake in all of biology. That mistake is Guanine. And what a mistake it is!

Guanine (G), along with adenine (A), thymine (T) and cytosine (C), are the four bases of DNA, which is used in all biological systems (except some viruses) to encode genetic information. The stability and integrity of genetic information are of critical importance to all living systems.

Incredibly, Guanine is chemically unstable. Guanine, in the oxidizing environment of a cell converts to 8-oxoGuanine. Guanine is so unstable that 100,000 Guanines convert to 8-oxoGuanines in an average mammalian cell each day (1). Cells have elaborate and multilayered systems to repair 8-oxoGuanine (2) in their attempts to maintain genetic integrity. Even so, 8-oxoGuanine causes spontaneous mutation, cancer and aging (3,4).

Guanine is the most glaring and transcendental result of degeneration of the original optimal design. Gaunine has invaded biological systems, and is currently found to have assumed a variety of functions. It is a component of DNA and RNA. It is involved in cell signaling and metabolism. Guanine is everywhere.

Is it conceivable that an intelligent and beneficent designer would use Guanine to encode genetic information in man, made in God's own image? Would you store important tax information in wax imprints? No, because wax is not stable. Duh! When it melts, important information is lost. Darwinists propose that Guanine was incorporated into living systems by a random, heartless and amoral process of evolution. Design Scientists believe Gaunine arose via degeneration of an optimal design. But here there is common ground. All agree that an Intelligent Designer would not use Guanine in the genetic code.

Gaunine leads surely and inexorably to 8-oxoGuanine, which in turn causes cancer and aging. We can say with certainty that there was no Guanine in the Garden of Eden. Adam and Eve had C, A and T, but not G in their DNA. This conclusion is consistent with the expectations of many theologians who think, based on their understanding of Judeo-Christian doctrine and scripture, that the physical world was optimally designed but should show evidence of subsequent decay. Mr. Meyer suggests that we should deduce the noble aboriginal design. We have done so. It is The G-less Genome. We will expand on the concept of the G-less Genome in future publications.



References

1. Park, E. M., Shigenaga, M. K., Degan, P., Korn, T. S., Kitzler, J. W., Wehr, C. M., Kolachana, P. and Ames, B. N. (1992) "Assay of Excised Oxidative DNA Lesions: Isolation of 8-Oxoguanine and its Nucleoside Derivatives from Biological Fluids with a Monoclonal Antibody Column" Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci., U.S.A. 89, 3375-9.

2. Michaels, M. L. and Miller, J. H. (1992) "The GO System Protects Organisms from the Mutagenic Effect of the Spontaneous Lesion 8-Hydroxyguanine (7,8-Dihydro-8-Oxoguanine)" J. Bacteriol. 174, 6321-6325.

3. Epe, B. (1991) "Genotoxicity of Singlet Oxygen." Chem. Biol. Interact. 80, 239-60.

4. Grollman, A. P. and Moriya, M. (1993) "Mutagenesis by 8-Oxoguanine: An Enemy Within" Trends Genet. 9, 246-9.