[vikramkr]

Interesting thought. Theres no way for that to work with DNA really, since information is included there in a chemical sequence rather than a shape necessarily. Though there are epigenetic aspects that could maybe work that way, but that's not in the spirit of what you proposed. Maybe an alien form of life with a different information storage mechanism.

Right here at home though, if you want a life-approximating thing that actually does reproduce that way, you're in luck. Prions are proteins (a type of biological molecule) that make more of themselves in pretty much that way. They arent alive and they arent cells, but they reproduce by bumping into normally shaped proteins and making them be shaped in the same way. They cause all sorts of terrible diseases like mad cow and tend to be incurable since, well, theres really not much to kill or stop, it's just a protein, making other proteins look the same way, very fascinating and very scary - there are hypothesis that suggest prion like processes could be involved in neurodegenerative diseases like alzheimers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prion