NeoGenesis: How Scientists Are Creating Alternate Life Forms

Scientists are attempting to produce new life forms. They plan to carry this out by providing genetic material with a different than earthly building block in their cellular structures. This process of producing new life is called neogenesis. Scientists believe that by performing neogenesis, it will allow them to understand how evolution occurred in terrestrial animals, and how life may have formed on other planets. The building blocks these scientists are focusing on are the twenty amino acids highly found in animals. As an attempt to produce neogenesis, they plan to induce animals use an amino acid that is foreign to the animal and determine what effect it will have on protein formation, and activity. As a result of this investigation, scientists also plan to use the results as a means to discriminate between DNA found on Mars from DNA found on Earth.
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/generalscience/neogenesis_scitues_010501-1.html