Nucleobase and amino acid formation through impacts of meteorites on the early ocean

Furukawa, Yoshihiro; Nakazawa, Hiroyuki; Sekine, Toshimori; Kobayashi, Takamichi; Kakegawa, Takeshi

doi:10.1016/j.epsl.2015.07.049

Cited by 51 publications

(44 citation statements)

References 48 publications

(63 reference statements)

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“…However, the rapid production of NH 3 during shock compression would be also quite important. In previous shock studies2532 that have been successful in producing amino acids, NH 3 was assumed to exist before the meteorite impact ( e.g. those dissolved in the sea or included in comets).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, if such reduced nitrogen and carbon sources can be produced from terrestrial molecules in the early stage of Earth during shock compression, the meteorites including metallic iron would also provide a similar result obtained in the case of the comet. The possibility would be high, taking into account that the recent shock experiments by Nakazawa et al 25. demonstrated the production of a variety of amino acids and nucleobases in shocked sample including metallic iron.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This in turn would have induced chemical interactions among meteoritic materials such as irons, atmosphere, and ocean. In fact, previous experimental and theoretical works have reported the production of various reductive volatiles from inorganic molecules, by simulating the impact events on the early Earth171819202122232425. Under such a circumstance, Nakazawa et al 26.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…In addition, impact velocities of the experiments were much lower26 (~1 km/s) than typical impact velocities of meteorites28 (above 10 km/s), and the possibility of further increase in the production amount for higher-energy impacts remains to be examined. Since Nakazawa et al 25. have recently succeeded in producing nine types of proteinogenic amino acids and of two types of nucleobases under shock in a sample including NH 3 as nitrogen sources, elucidation of the shock-induced NH 3 production processes is quite important in that leads to an understanding of production mechanisms for important nitrogen precursors of fundamental biomolecules such as amino acids.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Meteorite Impact-Induced Rapid NH3 Production on Early Earth: Ab Initio Molecular Dynamics Simulation

Shimamura

Shimojo

Nakano

et al. 2016

Sci Rep

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NH3 is an essential molecule as a nitrogen source for prebiotic amino acid syntheses such as the Strecker reaction. Previous shock experiments demonstrated that meteorite impacts on ancient oceans would have provided a considerable amount of NH3 from atmospheric N2 and oceanic H2O through reduction by meteoritic iron. However, specific production mechanisms remain unclear, and impact velocities employed in the experiments were substantially lower than typical impact velocities of meteorites on the early Earth. Here, to investigate the issues from the atomistic viewpoint, we performed multi-scale shock technique-based ab initio molecular dynamics simulations. The results revealed a rapid production of NH3 within several picoseconds after the shock, indicating that shocks with greater impact velocities would provide further increase in the yield of NH3. Meanwhile, the picosecond-order production makes one expect that the important nitrogen source precursors of amino acids were obtained immediately after the impact. It was also observed that the reduction of N2 proceeded according to an associative mechanism, rather than a dissociative mechanism as in the Haber-Bosch process.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Meteorite Impact-Induced Rapid NH3 Production on Early Earth: Ab Initio Molecular Dynamics Simulation

Shimamura

Shimojo

Nakano

et al. 2016

Sci Rep

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“…In cells, for instance, ribosomes whose main component are RNAs that synthesize a variety of protein species, such as polymerases, that catalyze RNA replication [1]. When considering the origins of life, it is therefore necessary to understand the emergence of a primordial polymer system that allows for self-replicating catalytic reactions, in which resource monomers such as amino acids or nucleotides, which are the building blocks of polymers, are supplied [2,3]. It is also important to understand the timescale of the synthesis of catalytic polymers by polymerizing reactions of the monomers.…”

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confidence: 99%

Optimal size for emergence of self-replicating polymer system

Matsubara

Kaneko

2016

Phys. Rev. E

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A biological system consists of a variety of polymers that are synthesized from monomers, by catalysis that exists only for some long polymers. It is important to elucidate the emergence and sustenance of such autocatalytic polymerization. We analyze here the stochastic polymerization reaction dynamics, to investigate the transition time from a state with almost no catalysts to a state with sufficient catalysts. We found an optimal volume that minimizes this transition time, which agrees with the inverse of the catalyst concentration at the unstable fixed point that separates the two states, as is theoretically explained. Relevance to the origin of life is also discussed.All life systems known so far consist of a wide variety of polymers that catalyze each other and are replicated through catalytic reactions. In cells, for instance, ribosomes whose main component are RNAs that synthesize a variety of protein species, such as polymerases, that catalyze RNA replication [1]. When considering the origins of life, it is therefore necessary to understand the emergence of a primordial polymer system that allows for self-replicating catalytic reactions, in which resource monomers such as amino acids or nucleotides, which are the building blocks of polymers, are supplied [2,3]. It is also important to understand the timescale of the synthesis of catalytic polymers by polymerizing reactions of the monomers.In this scenario, a polymer has to be long enough to function as a catalyst. In general, without catalysts, a chemical reaction to synthesize such a long polymer is extremely slow, while polymers, even if they are synthesized, are constantly degraded or diffused out. The synthesis can overcome possible degradation or diffusion only under catalysts (enzyme for protein; ribozyme for RNA) that accelerate the reaction by 10 7 ∼ 10 19 [4]. To sustain such a catalytically active state, a certain amount of catalysts is needed, which in turn is only synthesized from catalysts. Hence, the reaction system with autocatalytic polymers is expected to exhibit bi-stability between the inactive state with almost no catalysts and the active state with abundant catalysts that reproduce themselves. In fact, the importance of the transition from the inactive to active state for the emergence of a primitive replicating system has already been pointed out in the seminal work by Dyson [5], while catalytic reaction networks have also been extensively studied [6][7][8][9][10][11]. Here, we study this problem by considering a simple autocatalytic polymerization process, with an aim to obtain the time required for the transition from the inactive to active states.The existence of bistable states and the transition to a catalytically active state has been discussed recently [12,13]. In these studies, the rate equation of the concentrations of the monomers and polymers were often adopted. However, when considering the emergence of catalytic polymers, the number of molecules with negligible fluctuations may not be so large. These fluctuations enable...

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Ab initio molecular dynamics study of prebiotic production processes of organic compounds at meteorite impacts on ocean

et al. 2018

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Recent experiments concerning prebiotic materials syntheses suggest that the iron-bearing meteorite impacts on ocean during Late Heavy Bombardment provided abundant organic compounds associated with biomolecules such as amino acids and nucleobases. However, the molecular mechanism of a series of chemical reactions to produce such compounds is not well understood. In this study, we simulate the shock compression state of a meteorite impact for a model system composed of CO 2 , H 2 O, and metallic iron slab by ab initio molecular dynamics combined with multiscale shock technique, and clarify possible elementary reaction processes up to production of organic compounds. The reactions included not only pathways similar to the Fischer-Tropsch process known as an important hydrocarbon synthesis in many planetary processes but also those resulting in production of a carboxylic acid. It is also found that bicarbonate ions formed from CO 2 and H 2 O participated in some forms in most of these observed elementary reaction processes. These findings would deepen the understanding of the full range of chemical reactions that could occur in the meteorite impact events.

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Nucleobase and amino acid formation through impacts of meteorites on the early ocean

Cited by 51 publications

References 48 publications

Meteorite Impact-Induced Rapid NH3 Production on Early Earth: Ab Initio Molecular Dynamics Simulation

Meteorite Impact-Induced Rapid NH3 Production on Early Earth: Ab Initio Molecular Dynamics Simulation

Optimal size for emergence of self-replicating polymer system

Ab initio molecular dynamics study of prebiotic production processes of organic compounds at meteorite impacts on ocean

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