Computational power of gene rearrangement

In 8] we proposed a model to describe the homologous recombi-nations that take place during massive gene rearrangements in hypotrichous ciliates. Here we develop the model by introducing the dependency of homol-ogous recombinations on the presence of certain contexts. We then prove that such a model has the computational power of a Turing machine. This indicates that, in principle, some unicellular organisms may have the capacity to perform any computation carried out by an electronic computer.