Because the number of purine bases will, to a very good approximation, equal the number of their complementary pyrimidines within the same strand and, because the coding sequences occupy 80-90% of the strand, there appears to be (1) a selective pressure on the third base to minimize the number of purine bases in the strand with the greater coding content; and (2) that this pressure is proportional to the mismatch in the length of the coding sequences between the two strands.