A recent research has nailed down four-stranded DNA in human cells. Though double helix is known to be present, it is for the first time that "quadruple helix" has been found in the human cells, as per authors in the journal Nature Chemistry.

"We need to prove that; but if that is the case, targeting them with synthetic molecules could be an interesting way of selectively targeting those cells that have this dysfunction", said Prof Shankar Balasubramanian from Cambridge's department of chemistry, while claiming that there are chances that a lot would be done to come out with newer ways to fight against diseases like cancer.

It was some 60 years back that the double helix was found by James Watson and Francis Crick in their Cambridge laboratory, and till now the complexities behind the DNA stricture are being worked out.

Financially backed by Cancer Research UK, the research is believed to be the result of last 10 years of rigorous work, which was apparently started with as hypothetical computer models and now has culminated to the four stranded DNA named "G-quadruplexes" in vivo. It has also been found in the research led by Giulia Biffi at the Cambridge Research Institute that quadruplexes are most likely to exist in genes of cells which are quickly divisible.