The Eight Trigrams of the I Ching Provide a New Avenue for Characterizing the Association between mRNA Codons and the Hydrophobicity of the Encoded Amino Acids

Abstract

The standard genetic code is nearly universal, and relates the sequence of a translated messenger RNA (mRNA) to the sequence of amino acids in the resultant protein. Previous studies have related the second position of the mRNA codon to the hydrophobicity of the encoded amino acid. The research aim of this study was to investigate any other relationships that might exist. The author explored the association between both the first and the second positions of the mRNA codon with the hydrophobicity of the encoded amino acid based on their characterization according to the eight trigrams of the I Ching. The author found that most hydrophilic amino acids are associated with mRNA codons whose first two bases are in the middle four trigrams and form intermediate or weak hydrogen bonds with tRNA anticodons, whereas most hydrophobic amino acids are associated with mRNA codons located at the Yang end (i.e., the first two bases of the codon are strong followed by strong) or the Yin end (i.e., the first two bases of the codon are weak followed by weak). The eight trigrams provide a new avenue for characterizing the association between mRNA codons and the hydrophobicity of the encoded amino acids.