Proteins are the basic building blocks of life.

Judged as a general scientific statement in its usual sense. True if mainstream biology sources describe proteins as fundamental or basic building blocks of life. Mostly true if proteins are described as among the essential building blocks, alongside nucleic acids, lipids and carbohydrates, so that the claim is broadly right but simplified. Mostly false if mainstream sources reject calling proteins building blocks. False if proteins are shown not to be fundamental to living things.

Set before the research began.

1. E1 Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2024 The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences / Nobel Prize organisation · 9 October 2024

   “Life could not exist without proteins. That we can now predict protein structures and design our own proteins confers the greatest benefit to humankind.”

2. E2 Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2024 The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences / Nobel Prize organisation · 9 October 2024

   “Proteins also function as hormones, signal substances, antibodies and the building blocks of different tissues.”

3. E3 Physiology, Proteins StatPearls via NCBI Bookshelf (National Library of Medicine, NIH) · 14 November 2022

   “Proteins serve crucial roles in human biochemistry. The major role is to provide the body's building blocks.”

4. E4 Macromolecules Clackamas Community College (open educational resource, BIO106) · 1 October 2020

   “After nucleic acids, proteins are the most important macromolecules.”

The Nobel Prize press release says life could not exist without proteins and describes them as building blocks of tissues (E1, E2). The NIH-hosted StatPearls reference says the major role of proteins is to provide the body's building blocks (E3). A college biology module, however, ranks proteins as one of several major macromolecules and places them second to nucleic acids (E4). Together the sources support proteins as essential building blocks of life, but as one class among several, so the claim is broadly right but simplified.