Definition of "genetic code" []

• The sequence of nucleotides in DNA or RNA that determines the specific amino acid sequence in the synthesis of proteins. It is the biochemical basis of heredity and nearly universal in all organisms. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "There is no clue in nature as to how these simple laws could induce the nonrepetitive, multi-faceted information we associate with the genetic code or the proteins made from the information stored in those genetic codes."
• "The genetic code is redundant, with some amino acids being coded for by multiple three-nucleotide sequences of DNA."
• "The information stored in the genetic code common to all life, DNA, is not implied by the biological building blocks of DNA, neither in the nucleotide letters nor in the phospho-diester bonds along which those letters are strung."