Open AccessSearching for Nucleic Acid Alternatives
Author(s) -
Albert Eschenmoser
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
chimia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.387
H-Index - 55
eISSN - 2673-2424
pISSN - 0009-4293
DOI - 10.2533/000942905777675552
Subject(s) - nucleic acid , oligonucleotide , character (mathematics) , oligomer , computer science , work (physics) , envelope (radar) , biochemical engineering , chemistry , nanotechnology , materials science , dna , engineering , biochemistry , mathematics , organic chemistry , mechanical engineering , telecommunications , radar , geometry
"Back of the envelope" methods have their place in experimental chemical research; they are effective mediators in the generation of research ideas, for instance, the design of molecular structures. Their qualitative character is part of their strength, rather than a drawback for the role they have to play. Qualitative conformational analysis of oligonucleotide and other oligomer systems on the level of idealized conformations is one such method; it has played a helpful role in our work on the chemical etiology of nucleic acid structure. This article, while giving a short overview of that work, shows how.