Answer:
Protein is the genetic material; not DNA.
Step-by-step explanation:
In Avery, MacLeod, and McCarty's experiment, digestion of proteins with the enzyme protease and use of this extract from the heat-killed S cell did not affect its ability to transform the R cell into the S cells. However, there was no transformation when the cellular extract of heat-killed S cells was treated with DNAse enzyme. They concluded that DNA was the genetic material responsible for transformation.
If protease treatment of cellular extracts of heat-killed S cell would have prevented the process of transformation, protein would have been concluded to be the genetic material.