I believe I may have misunderstood water solubility this entire time.
I assumed that water soluble meant that it would literally dissolve in water. It would break down into atoms. A sugar molecule would break its bonds and become something else...
However I must be mistaken because I'm reading about why DNA is spiral shaped and it says that it is to keep the hydrophobic bases inside the spiral to protect them from the water, but keeping the hydrophilic phosphate and sugar molecules on the outside. I would assume that because these molecules are hydrophilic they would disassociate from each other but this has to be incorrect. What am I misunderstanding about water solubility and what would happen if the bases were exposed to water?