Signaling games and the genetic code

What is it about?

We devise a mathematical model based on signaling game theory to describe the evolution of the genetic code from RNA strings and amino acids.

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Why is it important?

Other studies have argued that the genetic code's optimality is a sign that the RNA world evolved first as a syncitia, with no colocalization of RNA strings. We show that this is not necessary for optimization of the code and that game theory predicts that the formation of cells is crucial for the code's development. We also postulate that the first polypeptides were likely very short, and may have not been enzymes in the traditional sense.