Mendel also followed the scientific method in a logical manner keeping accurate records of his work and foccusing on one inherited trait at at time in an experiment. The researchers never received a Nobel prize for their breakthrough observation. These investigators answered a critical question of how genes function by studying a common bread mold known as Neurospora crassa. By studying mutants of this mold, the reseachers were able to establish that a different enzyme was used at eash step in a biochemial pathway involving the breakdown of glucose. Many believe that Rosalind Franklin deserved to share the prize as her X-ray crystallography studies of DNA provided many important clues about its structure.
Transposons are small DNA elements that can move between chromosomes and plasmids.
The genetic code or language is universal. Viruses and all living organisms expoit the same four-letter alphabet to spell out their genetic instructions. Superficially, we could not tell based on the A, T, C, G alphabet if we were dealing with a virus, a fruit-fly or a human being. What is important is how the alphabet and genes are arranged . It is how the letters of the genetic alphabet are arranged that spells out the nature of an organism.