The Universal & Atomic Elements of Organization
A falsifiable scientific theory proposing that the same irreducible structures organize both thought and reality — from the quantum to the social scale.
O-Theory proposes that four irreducible structures — Distinctions, Systems, Relationships and Perspectives (DSRP) — form the universal grammar of organization. Rather than being merely useful ways of thinking, these structures are hypothesized to be the atomic elements from which every organized phenomenon emerges, whether in cognition, biology, physics, mathematics, society, or the cosmos.
| D | S | R | P |
| Distinctions | Systems | Relationships | Perspectives |
| Identity ↔ Other | Part ↔ Whole | Action ↔ Reaction | Point ↔ View |
| D := (i ↔ o) | S := (p ↔ w) | R := (a ↔ r) | P := (ṗ ↔ v) |
This is a living scientific evidence compendium: an open, continually evolving collection of independent empirical research, formal theory, mathematical proofs, cross-disciplinary analyses, applications, critiques, and proposed falsifications. Every entry is included because it supports, refines, challenges, or attempts to falsify the theory.
Scientific theories are strengthened not only by evidence that confirms their predictions, but also by surviving attempts to falsify them. This compendium brings both together: independent evidence from researchers who were not testing DSRP and proposed counterexamples evaluated against the formal theory.
One counterexample is enough to falsify O-Theory. Until then, the question remains: do the same four structures organize everything from quantum systems to human thought?
Independent convergence is one of the strongest forms of scientific evidence because researchers arrive at the same conclusion while investigating different questions for different reasons.
The number is not the point. Researchers in different fields, studying different questions with different methods, repeatedly arrived at the same structural predictions—almost always without testing DSRP or using its language.
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This compendium began as the peer-reviewed literature review “A Literature Review of the Universal and Atomic Elements of Complex Cognition,” published in the Journal of Systems Thinking with 109 studies. That paper is the peer-reviewed foundation. What you see here is its living, continuously updated version . New studies are checked before they are added, and the collection now holds and keeps growing. Open any card to see what the researchers found, why it bears on DSRP, and where the original review discusses it, the fuller account.
The collection is updated continuously, so the citation carries the date you consulted it rather than a study count — the count changes weekly, and putting it in the reference would make the same collection look like a different work to everyone who cites it. To cite a single claim or study, use its own address: every one has a permanent link.
This is the adversarial half of the compendium. Where the evidence track asks what converges on DSRP, this one asks what would end it: a single organized phenomenon whose structure needs a fifth pattern, a ninth element, or a fifth structural dynamic. It holds written up from candidates across territories, and resolutions — the general answers those cases settle against. Every case is published whether it held or failed, including the ones still open.
Cite this rather than the evidence collection when the point is what survived attack. The two are separate works with separate addresses: one asks what converges on the theory, the other asks what would end it, and a reference to the first does not support a claim about the second. Case and resolution numbers change when the record is revised, so cite a case by its own permanent link rather than by number.
This collection is meant to keep growing. Send us a study, paper, book or critique that bears on DSRP, whether it supports the theory or cuts against it, and we will read it and decide whether it belongs.
Authors Yihao Wu, Muhammad Ghufran Rafique, Christopher Saab, Hanadi Sleiman
Year 2026
Publisher Angewandte Chemie International Edition
Kind of work article
Discipline Chemistry
Secondary disciplines Materials Science
Read it at the publisher 10.1002/anie.1147906
DNA self-assembly expands through non-natural nucleotides with tunable hydrophobic effects in double-crossover tiles. Sequence-defined amphiphiles regulate hierarchical assembly order, enabling quantized star architectures and spherical nucleic acids. Narcissistic self-sorting allows distinct populations from identical sequences, demonstrating extensibility to other DNA nanostructures and enabling protein-like assembly pathways.
To expand DNA nanotechnology by using non-natural, hydrophobicity-tunable nucleotides in DNA tiles to control the order and outcome of hierarchical self-assembly.
Synthetic double-crossover DNA tiles modified with sequence-defined hydrophobic (amphiphilic) non-natural nucleotides.
DNA tiles bearing systematically varied hydrophobic modifications were self-assembled in vitro; resulting architectures (quantized stars vs. crosslinked spherical nucleic acids) and self-sorting behavior were characterized as a function of hydrophobic strength.
Tuning the hydrophobic strength of modified DNA tiles sets a threshold that determines assembly order — weak hydrophobicity yields base-pairing-first, quantized star architectures, while strong hydrophobicity yields hydrophobic-collapse-first, crosslinked spherical nucleic acids — and also enables 'narcissistic' self-sorting of distinct populations from identical sequences.
A hydrophobicity threshold is a Distinction (D) that switches which part-whole assembly pathway is taken, so the same DNA tile components combine into different hierarchical wholes (a Systems, S, structure) depending on which side of that threshold they fall on.
Patterns it shows D, S
Added 2026-09-16
How to cite this Yihao Wu, Muhammad Ghufran Rafique, Christopher Saab, Hanadi Sleiman (2026). Expanding the DNA Nanotechnology Toolbox: Hierarchical Assembly and Self-Sorting of DNA Tiles With Precisely Controlled Hydrophobic Behavior. Angewandte Chemie International Edition.