Evidence map›Paper›PMID 34873040›Full record

ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2021

Mutations in artificial self-replicating tiles: A step toward Darwinian evolution.

Feng Zhou, Ruojie Sha, Heng Ni, Nadrian Seeman, Paul Chaikin

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 9 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
9citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

9 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Article
  2. Article
  3. Evolutionary features in a minimal physical system: Diversity, selection, growth, inheritance, and adaptation.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
  4. An enzyme-based approach for highly efficient self-replication of DNA origami dimers.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
  5. Proliferating active matter.Nature reviews. Physics · 2023
    Review
  6. Review
  7. Article
  8. Article
  9. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors.

Feng ZhouDepartment of Physics, New York University, New York, NY 10003; zfedward1988@gmail.com ned.seeman@nyu.edu chaikin@nyu.edu.ORCID 0000-0002-6571-5969
Ruojie ShaDepartment of Chemistry, New York University, New York, NY 10003.
Heng NiDepartment of Physics, New York University, New York, NY 10003.ORCID 0000-0002-7521-0657
Nadrian SeemanDepartment of Chemistry, New York University, New York, NY 10003 zfedward1988@gmail.com ned.seeman@nyu.edu chaikin@nyu.edu.
Paul ChaikinDepartment of Physics, New York University, New York, NY 10003; zfedward1988@gmail.com ned.seeman@nyu.edu chaikin@nyu.edu.ORCID 0000-0001-9864-0089

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Artificial self-replication and exponential growth holds the promise of gaining a better understanding of fundamental processes in nature but also of evolving new materials and devices with useful properties. A system of DNA origami dimers has been shown to exhibit exponential growth and selection. Here we introduce mutation and growth advantages to study the possibility of Darwinian-like evolution. We seed and grow one dimer species, AB, from A and B monomers that doubles in each cycle. A similar species from C and D monomers can replicate at a controlled growth rate of two or four per cycle but is unseeded. Introducing a small mutation rate so that AB parents infrequently template CD offspring we show experimentally that the CD species can take over the system in approximately six generations in an advantageous environment. This demonstration opens the door to the use of evolution in materials design.

Indexed as

Biological EvolutionGenetic FitnessAnimalsBase SequenceBiochemical PhenomenaDNADNA ReplicationMutationDNAartificial self-replicationcross-tile DNA origamiDarwinian evolutionexponential growthmutation

Identifiers

PMID34873040
PMCPMC8685680

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Registered trials

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.