Abstract
AbstractThe mechanism by which genetic polymers spontaneously formed on the early Earth is currently unknown. The RNA World hypothesis implies that RNA oligomers were produced prebiotically, but the demonstration of this process has proven challenging. Alternatively, RNA may be the product of evolution and some, or all, of its chemical components may have been preceded by functionally analogous moieties that were more readily accessible under plausible early-Earth conditions. We report a new class of nucleic acid analog, depsipeptide nucleic acid, which displays several properties that make it an attractive candidate for the first informational polymer to arise on the Earth. The monomers of depsipeptide nucleic acids can form under plausibly prebiotic conditions. These monomers oligomerize spontaneously when dried from aqueous solutions to form nucleobase-functionalized depsipeptides. Once formed, these depsipeptide nucleic acid oligomers are capable of complementary self-assembly, and are resistant to hydrolysis in the assembled state. These results suggest that the initial formation of primitive, self-assembling, informational polymers may have been relatively facile.
Publisher
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Reference65 articles.
1. Experimentally investigating the origin of DNA/RNA on early Earth;Nat. Commun,2018
2. Joyce, G. F. ; Orgel, L. E. , Prospects for understanding the origin of the RNA world. In The RNA World, Second Edition: The Nature of Modern RNA Suggests a Prebiotic RNA World, Gesteland, R. F. ; Atkins, J. F. , Eds. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press: Cold Spring Harbor, NY, 1999; pp 49–77.
3. Yadav, M. ; Kumar, R. ; Krishnamurthy, R. , Chemistry of Abiotic Nucleotide Synthesis. Chem Rev 2020.
4. Prebiotic Syntheses of Noncanonical Nucleosides and Nucleotides;Chem Rev,2020
5. Searching for lost nucleotides of the pre-RNA World with a self-refining model of early Earth;Nat. Commun,2018