Rather than seeking to design new proteins rationally, piece by carefully calculated piece — as many protein chemists have tried and mostly failed to do — the Arnold approach lets basic evolutionary algorithms do the work of protein composition and protein upgrades. You start with a protein that already has some features you’re interested in, such as stability in high heat or a knack for clipping apart fats. Using a standard lab trick such as polymerase chain reaction, you randomly mutate the gene that encodes the protein. Through directed evolution, Dr. Arnold’s lab has generated microbes that do what organisms in nature have never been known to do. “We didn’t even have to nag the protein too hard to get it to do it.”

Source: New York Times May 28, 2019 06:30 UTC