Boundary versus enabling conditions for the origins of life

Ruiz-Mirazo, Kepa

doi:10.1016/j.plrev.2020.06.001

Cited by 4 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 4 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The chemistry that sustains life is complex with many pathways and components integrated together within a highly organized compartment that defies thermodynamic equilibrium. Narrow investigations of individual synthetic pathways in isolation and in absence of a compartment will likely be less informative than, as Ruiz-Mirazo et al [1,2] argue, systems level approaches that search for commonalities and synergies between chemistries and phases that could help to explain why life is as it is today.…”

Section: Protometabolismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Protometabolism as out-of-equilibrium chemistry

Nader

Sebastianelli

Mansy

2022

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

It is common to compare life with machines. Both consume fuel and release waste to run. In biology, the engine that drives the living system is referred to as metabolism. However, attempts at deciphering the origins of metabolism do not focus on this energetic relationship that sustains life but rather concentrate on nonenzymatic reactions that produce all the intermediates of an extant metabolic pathway. Such an approach is akin to studying the molecules produced from the burning of coal instead of deciphering how the released energy drives the movement of pistons and ultimately the train when investigating the mechanisms behind locomotion. Theories that do explicitly invoke geological chemical gradients to drive metabolism most frequently feature hydrothermal vent conditions, but hydrothermal vents are not the only regions of the early Earth that could have provided the fuel necessary to sustain the Earth's first (proto)cells. Here, we give examples of prior reports on protometabolism and highlight how more recent investigations of out-of-equilibrium systems may point to alternative scenarios more consistent with the majority of prebiotic chemistry data accumulated thus far. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Emergent phenomena in complex physical and socio-technical systems: from cells to societies’.

show abstract

Section: Protometabolismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Protometabolism as out-of-equilibrium chemistry

Nader

Sebastianelli

Mansy

2022

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“Minimal metabolism”: A key concept to investigate the origins and nature of biological systems

2021

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The systems view on life and its emergence from complex chemistry has remarkably increased the scientific attention on metabolism in the last two decades. However, during this time there has not been much theoretical discussion on what constitutes a metabolism and what role it actually played in biogenesis. A critical and updated review on the topic is here offered, including some references to classical models from last century, but focusing more on current and future research. Metabolism is considered as intrinsically related to the living but not necessarily equivalent to it. More precisely, the idea of “minimal metabolism”, in contrast to previous, top‐down conceptions, is formulated as a heuristic construct, halfway between chemistry and biology. Thus, rather than providing a complete or final characterization of metabolism, our aim is to encourage further investigations on it, particularly in the context of life's origin, for which some concrete methodological suggestions are provided. Also see the video abstract here: https://youtu.be/DP7VMKk2qpA

show abstract