What was the Hershey Chase experiment and what were its key findings?
The Hershey-Chase experiment was a scientific study conducted in 1952 by Alfred Hershey and Martha Chase. They used bacteriophages, viruses that infect bacteria, to demonstrate that DNA, not protein, is the genetic material that carries hereditary information. The key finding of the experiment was that when the bacteriophages infected bacteria, only the DNA of the virus was injected into the bacterial cell, not the protein coat. This provided strong evidence that DNA is the molecule responsible for transmitting genetic information.