Final answer:
The Avery, MacLeod, and McCarty experiment concluded that DNA was the genetic material responsible for bacterial transformation, using a systematic elimination approach, which was later confirmed by the Hershey-Chase experiment.
Step-by-step explanation:
The Avery, MacLeod, and McCarty experiment demonstrated that DNA was the transforming principle first described by Griffith. They isolated the S strain of pneumonia bacteria, heat-killed it, and extracted several components including proteins and nucleic acids (RNA and DNA). Using enzymes that specifically degraded each of these components, they treated the R strain of bacteria separately with each mixture. They observed that only when DNA was removed did the mixture lose its ability to transform the non-virulent R strain into the virulent S strain, thereby showing that DNA was the genetic material responsible for transformation.
This systematic elimination study led to the conclusion that DNA was responsible for carrying and transferring genetic information, challenging the previously held belief that proteins, due to their greater complexity, were more likely to carry genetic information. Despite their pivotal findings, Avery's team initially did not receive the recognition they deserved, as the scientific community was reluctant to abandon the notion that proteins were the genetic material. It was not until the Hershey-Chase experiment in 1952 that DNA's role as the genetic material was broadly accepted.