The tRNA ensures the cohesion of the polymerase and the associated factors; without it, they would not arrange themselves in this way.
Image: Clemens Grimm.
Researchers at Julius Maximilian University of Würzburg (JMU) have discovered that poxviruses have developed a unique strategy to multiply rapidly after infecting a host cell. They achieve this by assembling a large protein complex with the help of a transfer RNA (tRNA) molecule. Remarkably, this is the first known example of a ‘chaperone’ function being carried out by a tRNA rather than a protein. Each component of the assembly plays a specific role in the production of new poxviruses. Crucially, the complex only functions when all parts are correctly assembled, and the tRNA is indispensable for this construction.
In other words, the tRNA provides the essential element of the complex, which some might describe—using the Discovery Institute’s own terms—as containing “complex specified information” and forming an “irreducibly complex” system essential to the virus’s success.
By that same logic, it follows that the viruses responsible for smallpox and mpox (monkeypox) must have been intelligently designed. This leaves creationists with an unenviable dilemma:
- Accept the Discovery Institute’s definitions and admit their designer created deadly viruses — theologically awkward.
- Claim another intelligence designs life, beyond their god’s control — even more awkward.
- Abandon the Institute’s “evidence” for intelligent design — politically awkward.
