The molecule that runs every living cell — explored in 3D. Then watch it choreograph its own duplication: mitosis builds an exact copy; meiosis shuffles the deck and deals four new hands.
Watson & Crick's B-form helix: ~10.5 base pairs per turn, 3.4 Å rise per base pair, right-handed twist. Drag to rotate, scroll to zoom. Hover a base pair to see the pairing rule and hydrogen bond count. Toggle the major/minor groove overlay or adjust sequence length with the slider below.
Two canvases. One story, two endings. Mitosis: one diploid parent splits into two identical diploid daughters — the body's workhorse. Meiosis: one diploid parent produces four haploid gametes, with crossover events that reshuffle maternal and paternal chromosomes before they separate. Play, pause, or step one phase at a time. Watch the coloured chromosome bars to see where recombination swaps segments.
Every structural and process detail in this exhibit is grounded in peer-reviewed molecular biology and cell biology literature.
The original letter proposing the antiparallel double-helix model for DNA, with the iconic note that the specific base pairing immediately suggests a copying mechanism. Nature 171:737–738.
doi:10.1038/171737a0Photo 51 and the precise X-ray diffraction measurements of B-form DNA — 3.4 Å rise per residue, 34 Å per turn — that underpinned Watson and Crick's model. Nature 171:740–741.
doi:10.1038/171740a0The standard reference for DNA structure, base-pair geometry, replication machinery, and the molecular choreography of mitosis and meiosis. W.W. Norton / Garland Science, 2022.
Garland catalogueMechanistic review of meiotic recombination: how PRDM9 marks hotspots, how double-strand breaks are introduced by SPO11, and how crossover vs. non-crossover outcomes are regulated. Nature Reviews Genetics 8:517–529.
doi:10.1038/nrg2123Comprehensive treatment of cyclin–CDK regulation, checkpoint mechanisms, and the phase-by-phase choreography of mitosis and meiosis. New Science Press / Sinauer, 2007.
NCBI BookshelfAuthoritative review of synaptonemal complex formation, crossover designation, and the mechanical separation of homologs in meiosis I versus sister chromatids in meiosis II. Annual Review of Genetics 33:603–754.
doi:10.1146/annurev.genet.33.1.603