Decoding Life:
Scientific Insights on DNA, Origin, and Design
Are you Designed?
What does science reveal
about the origin of life?
You are unique—no one else has your DNA. Random processes cannot create this code.
Human DNA, your DNA strand, is 6 feet long and coiled together in each of your 37 Trillion cells of your body. DNA contains over 3 billion base pairs of genetic code that need to be arranged in a distinct order. DNA is a written language, more complex than computer code, that uses 4 nucleotide bases ATCG to communicate and direct processes in the cell to maintain life and give you your unique characteristics.
What is Life?
How did Life first begin?
What is required for Basic (Simple) Life?
Can random processes create life?
The following discussion will seek the TRUTH through scientific discovery and attempt to address these questions. We encourage you to open your mind, review the information and come to your own logical conclusions.
What is Life? Dr James Tour says “We don’t know? Have not got a clue.”
Dr James Tour frequently challenges professors and students to answer these questions. I have a single cell bacteria and it dies, what did it lose? All the parts are still there and put together, bring it back to life? It has never been done.
Chat GPT 6/2/25
Dr. James M. Tour is a distinguished American synthetic organic chemist and nanotechnologist, currently serving as the T. T. and W. F. Chao Professor of Chemistry, Professor of Computer Science, and Professor of Materials Science and NanoEngineering at Rice University in Houston, Texas.
Education and Academic Career
Dr. Tour earned his Bachelor of Science in Chemistry from Syracuse University in 1981 and completed his Ph.D. in synthetic organic and organometallic chemistry at Purdue University in 1986 under the mentorship of Nobel Laureate Ei-ichi Negishi. He pursued postdoctoral research in synthetic organic chemistry at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and Stanford University.
What is Life?
Is life more than a collection of assembled parts?
How does energy from atoms interact and affect the life of the cell? Does the energy relationship change from life to death? Is communication happening between Atoms? This is beyond our discussion here, however, we recommend further study in Molecular or Quantum Biology, Chemistry and Physics research, “Atomic Biology - How the atom affects Life?”
Dr. James Tour: How Did Life Come into Being?
Carbon Atom
ChatGPT Do atoms change from live to dead cells? 2/16/25
Atoms themselves do not change when a living cell dies, but their arrangement, bonding, and chemical interactions do. Here’s how:
1. Atoms Stay the Same, But Their Function Changes
The carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus, and sulfur atoms in a living cell are the same atoms in a dead cell.
What changes is how these atoms are bonded and how they interact with each other.
2. Chemical Reactions in Living vs. Dead Cells
Living Cells: Atoms constantly move and participate in metabolism, respiration, and energy production (e.g., ATP formation).
Dead Cells:
Metabolism stops → No more ATP or energy use.
Cell structures break down → Enzymes start autolysis (self-digestion).
Decomposition begins → Bacteria and fungi break down molecules, releasing atoms back into the environment.
3. Where Do the Atoms Go After Death?
Recycled into Nature: Carbon, nitrogen, and other elements return to the soil, air, or other organisms.
Used by Other Life Forms: Plants absorb carbon and nitrogen from decomposed matter, continuing the cycle of life.
Final Thought
Atoms in a dead cell don’t disappear—they just get rearranged and repurposed in nature. Life and death are part of a continuous atomic cycle!
Would you like to dive deeper into decomposition or atomic recycling in ecosystems?
Sources 2/16/25
What is Life? Continued
Back to our Discussion on Origin of Life. We can only describe the traits of life and the required elements needed for the most simple single cell.
Life definition
Life is "Responsiveness to the environment; growth and change; ability to reproduce; have a metabolism and breathe; maintain homeostasis; being made of cells; and passing traits onto offspring." "Homeostasis is a steady internal, physical and chemical condition." Source
Requirements for the simplest form of life, single cell bacteria
I encourage you to do your own research and recent advancements in AI allow quick and thorough research across millions of resources.
What is life ? Required for life?
Chat GPT 2/10/25
Dr. James Tour, a synthetic chemist known for his critiques of origin-of-life research, often emphasizes the complexity of even the simplest cell and the challenges in explaining how life could have arisen through natural processes. He highlights the following list of requirements for the simplest possible cell:
1. Functional Molecules
Proteins (Enzymes): For catalyzing biochemical reactions.
Nucleic Acids (DNA/RNA): To store and transmit genetic information.
Lipids (Membranes): To form a protective barrier around the cell and maintain internal conditions.
Carbohydrates: For energy storage and structural functions.
2. Membrane Formation and Selective Transport
The cell membrane must not only form spontaneously but also allow selective transport of nutrients and waste, a highly regulated process in modern cells.
3. Genetic Information and Replication System
A functional replication system is essential to pass genetic information to the next generation. This requires not just a stable genetic code (like DNA or RNA) but also mechanisms to copy it accurately.
4. Energy Production and Metabolism
A minimal cell must generate and regulate energy to perform essential functions, such as through a primitive metabolic network.
He emphasizes the complexity of energy-carrying molecules like ATP and the need for a functional energy conversion system.
5. Molecular Machinery
Complex molecular machines, like ribosomes, must be present to produce proteins from genetic instructions. Tour often stresses that these molecular machines are irreducibly complex and would not form spontaneously.
6. Error Correction and Regulation
Even the simplest cell must have mechanisms to prevent errors in replication and metabolism, ensuring survival and functionality.
7. Coordinated Interaction of Systems
All components must work together in a highly coordinated fashion. The failure of one system (e.g., metabolism, membrane integrity, genetic replication) would result in the death of the cell.
Episode 12.2/13: Cell Construction & Assembly Problem
Requirements for simple cell
Most simple single cell
Requirements for the simplest form of life, single cell bacteria
"This minimal gene set included genes for:
"DNA replication, repair, restriction, and modification;
"a basic transcription machinery;
"aminoacyl-tRNA synthesis;
"tRNA maturation and modification;
"ribosomal proteins;
"ribosome function, maturation, and modification;
"translation factors;
"RNA degradation;
"protein processing, folding, and secretion;
"cellular division; transport;
"and energetic and intermediary metabolism (glycolysis, proton motive force generation, pentose phosphate pathway, lipid metabolism, and biosynthesis of nucleotides and cofactors).
"Those authors did not include rRNA or tRNA genes, and they recognized that the basic substrate transport machinery could not be clearly defined, even though this minimal cell would rely greatly on the import of several substrates, including all 20 amino acids (for which it had no biosynthetic ability)."
Microbiol Mol Biol Rev. 2014 Sep; 78(3): 487–509.
doi: 10.1128/MMBR.00050-13
Systems Biology Perspectives on Minimal and Simpler Cells
Joana C. Xavier⁽ᵃ,ᵇ⁾, Kiran Raosaheb Patil⁽ᵇ⁾, and Isabel Rocha⁽ᵃ⁾
PMCID: PMC4187685
PMID: 25184563
5 Scientific DNA Facts Supporting Design in Origin of Life
When the Miller-Urey Experiment in 1953 produced simple Amino acids from prebiotic conditions, Origin of Life researchers believed it was only a matter of time before they were able to create life in the lab. Researchers continued to learn more about the complexities of life in a simple cell and the difficulty working in primordial conditions with unstable molecules. Life was not easy to create and the goalline of required elements to assemble continued to grow.
There are many Origin of Life challenges to focus on, however we will concentrate our discussion on 5 Scientific DNA Facts Supporting Design that question the current theories of Origin of Life.
5 Scientific DNA Facts Supporting Design
Fact 1
Prebiotic forces cannot create the basic DNA or RNA structure.
Fact 2
Prebiotic forces cannot create the basic building blocks needed for the development of the basic cell.
Fact 3
Prebiotic forces cannot arrange DNA nucleobases that contain the stored information of the DNA strand.
Fact 4
Prebiotic forces cannot create a basic cell which is required for the manipulation of DNA and recovery of its information.
Fact 5
DNA Transcription, Translation and Replication requires hundreds of complex proteins or protein machines to function.
Fact 1
Prebiotic forces cannot create the basic DNA or RNA structure.
Fact 2
Prebiotic forces cannot create the basic building blocks needed for the development of the basic cell.
Fact 3
Prebiotic forces cannot arrange DNA nucleobases that contain the stored information of the DNA strand.
Fact 4
Prebiotic forces cannot create a basic cell by arranging the four basic building blocks.
Fact 5
DNA Transcription, Translation and Replication requires hundreds of complex proteins and protein machines to function.
How did life begin?
Seek the Truth and follow the science.
We believe the scientific evidence of the complexities of life only offer one explanation.
“You are Designed”
Do you think you could be designed? No, Go EXPLORE “Learn More” and seek the Truth and search your soul. Yes, then continue with us as we examine common theories of: