Online handles and genetics

Andrew Hussie's 4/15/10 summary of one year's worth of Homestuck suggests a great deal of upcoming gameplay will revolve around genetics, in particular base pairings in DNA structure. The connection between Homestuck and DNA is the sixteen online handles, each one in use by the four Homestuck Kids and the twelve Trolls (some of which have yet to make an appearance).

Rose's revelation
Future Rose Lalonde has solved the mystery of Jaspers' mysterious MEOW, subconsciously locked and hidden away in Present Rose. The connection between MEOW and GCAT, which is scrawled on her walls, was discovered by Present Rose when Dream Rose awakened.

GCAT is a common presentation of the pairings of bases in the double helix structure of DNA, but in Homestuck is also a summary of the combinations of online handle abbreviations. G-C-A-T can be expanded into sixteen combinations of two-letter forms:

GG, GC, GA, GT, CG, CC, CA, CT, AG, AC, AA, AT, TG, TC, TA, TT

Here is the arrangement of these forms in alphabetical A-C-G-T order, as expressed by each online handle:

AA - apocalypseArisen

AC - arsenicCatnip

AG - arachnidsGrip

AT - adiosToreador

CA - caligulasAquarium

CC - cuttlefishCuller

CG - carcinoGeneticist (Karkat)

CT - centaursTesticle

GA - grimAuxiliatrix

GC - gallowsCalibrator (Terezi) GG - gardenGnostic (Jade)

GT - ghostyTrickster (John's former handle, later changed to ectoBiologist to escape the trolls)

TA - twinArmageddons

TC - terminallyCapricious (Gamzee)

TG - turntechGodhead (Dave)

TT - tentacleTherapist (Rose)

The four heroes comprise 1/4 of the listed pairs. It might be worth nothing that their combinations do not include the letters A or C.

The four primary trolls involved in the heroes' game so far comprise another 1/4 of the listed pairs.

CG - carcinoGeneticist, who pesters John

AT - adiosToreador, who pesters Dave with assistance from Rose

GA - grimAuxiliatrix, who pesters Rose with assistance from Dave

GC - gallowsCalibrator, who pesters John and Rose

Another allusion to the genetic involvement in this game is Rose's quest, which is revealed by Jaspers and later clarified by Andrew Hussie's one-year summary, to "play the rain to produce the musical analogue of a genetic code to reintroduce life into the ocean."

Basic DNA base pairings
DNA is made up of four nitrogen bases:
 * G = Guanine, a purine base
 * A = Adenine, a purine base
 * C = Cytosine, a pyrimidine base
 * T = Thymine, a pyrimidine base (replaced by uracil (U) in RNA)

DNA is a double helix and the two strands are held together by hydrogen bonds between A & T (2 bonds) and G & C (3 bonds). Purines form hydrogen bonds to pyrimidines, with A bonding only to T, and C bonding only to G.

DNA normally forms codons of three nucleotides, forming 64 possible combinations, which themselves, with some amount of redundancy, are spread among 22 possible "meanings" (start, stop, or one of twenty amino acids). The chumhandles, with only two letters, are therefore incomplete and meaningless in genetic code.

Whether Andrew intends to employ the more complex details of genetics in the progression of Homestuck is still unknown. However, it is clear that the relationship between the trolls and the heroes will prove significant in determining whether any of the heroes will survive their Sburb games, or defeat the Black Queen and King and save Skaia from its prophesied "inevitable destruction."

Pairing
The Trolls and Kids should match up as follows:

terminallyCapricious to arachnidsGrip, apocolypseArisen to tentacleTherapist, cuttlefishCuller to gardenGnostic, adiosToreador to twinArmeggedons, turntechGodhead to arsenicCatnip, ghostyTrickster (ectoBiologist) to caguliasAquarium, carcinoGeneticist to gallowsCalibrator, and grimAuxilatrix to centaursTesticles.

Whether they will be similar or different is uncertain, and there might be another connection. Despite the pairings theoretically implied by the GCAT notations, none of the Homestuck kids has interacted with their supposed counterpart to this point.