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Origin of Life: Molecular Model of a Protobiont
Leonid Andreev
Original paper "View on Lipids of Microorganisms from the Standpoint of Prebiotic and Biological Evolution" published in: Voprosy Evolutsii Bakterij (Evolution of Bacteria), USSR Academy of Sciences, Center for Biological Research, Institute of Biochemistry and Physiology of Microorganisms, Pushchino, 1984, pp. 93-119 (https://www.dropbox.com/s/tx666ilga018yvt/OriginOfLifeRus.pdf).
This paper was first published in 2004 on the company website of Equicom, Inc. which is no longer online
Origin of life on Earth has yet to find its own paradigm, and this fact overshadows the capabilities of contemporary science, although in reality it is well equipped for solving this problem. It is generally believed that the main cause of this predicament is the lack of material evidence that could provide a clue about the events that some four billion years ago had the life get started amidst the inorganic matter. Proceeding from that premise is a methodological deadlock: how to define the borderline between the non-life and the start of life – i.e. at what point in retrospect does the trail of evidence stop? If we take the most remarkable biological property inherent in all contemporary forms of life – reproduction – and try to trace it back so as to pinpoint its inception in the earliest forms of the living matter, we have to start with the emergence of the replication mechanism. But first there had to emerge something that was worth of replication.
Due to the lack of agreement on what can be qualified as a primordial sign of life, researchers in the origin of life have undertaken investigations on all probable and improbable leads, including anything of at least remote relevance to biosynthesis of molecules involved in contemporary organisms: synthesis of amino acids from simple inorganic molecules, catalytic properties of clay minerals, spontaneous formation of membrane-like structures, etc., up to ideas about spontaneously emerging DNA and RNA, which, in the opinion of the idea’s authors, should have resulted in miraculous appearance of biologically purposeful structures. All of such theories are based on presumption of spontaneity of transformation of nonliving matter into living matter. Essentially, all things considered, the difference between evolutionism and creationism is nothing but the extent of passion about the object of faith; and, on the scale of integrity and logic consistency, the science-wealthy evolutionism married to mysticism stands lower than creationism.
Twenty years ago, I published a paper explaining my hypothesis of the origin of life on Earth and presenting a molecular model of a protobiont, a hypothetical earliest ancestor of the biological cell. The paper was published in a collection of articles on evolution of bacteria, by the Center for Biological Research in Pushchino of the then USSR Academy of Sciences. Recently, having stumbled upon a few research papers dealing with the problem of the origin of life on Earth, I went on to see what has changed in general in this field within the past twenty years and have found out that there was nothing new. This has been a good stimulus for me to finally get to translate my 1984 paper into English and post it on this web site. Back then, I had every reason to muse on the role of lipids in the functioning of live organisms. Due to my years-long work in express
identification of bacteria, I had had an opportunity to investigate the fatty acid (and occasionally phospholipid) composition of over 33,000 strains of bacteria.
( Read more... )
Leonid Andreev
Original paper "View on Lipids of Microorganisms from the Standpoint of Prebiotic and Biological Evolution" published in: Voprosy Evolutsii Bakterij (Evolution of Bacteria), USSR Academy of Sciences, Center for Biological Research, Institute of Biochemistry and Physiology of Microorganisms, Pushchino, 1984, pp. 93-119 (https://www.dropbox.com/s/tx666ilga018yvt/OriginOfLifeRus.pdf).
Origin of life on Earth has yet to find its own paradigm, and this fact overshadows the capabilities of contemporary science, although in reality it is well equipped for solving this problem. It is generally believed that the main cause of this predicament is the lack of material evidence that could provide a clue about the events that some four billion years ago had the life get started amidst the inorganic matter. Proceeding from that premise is a methodological deadlock: how to define the borderline between the non-life and the start of life – i.e. at what point in retrospect does the trail of evidence stop? If we take the most remarkable biological property inherent in all contemporary forms of life – reproduction – and try to trace it back so as to pinpoint its inception in the earliest forms of the living matter, we have to start with the emergence of the replication mechanism. But first there had to emerge something that was worth of replication.
Due to the lack of agreement on what can be qualified as a primordial sign of life, researchers in the origin of life have undertaken investigations on all probable and improbable leads, including anything of at least remote relevance to biosynthesis of molecules involved in contemporary organisms: synthesis of amino acids from simple inorganic molecules, catalytic properties of clay minerals, spontaneous formation of membrane-like structures, etc., up to ideas about spontaneously emerging DNA and RNA, which, in the opinion of the idea’s authors, should have resulted in miraculous appearance of biologically purposeful structures. All of such theories are based on presumption of spontaneity of transformation of nonliving matter into living matter. Essentially, all things considered, the difference between evolutionism and creationism is nothing but the extent of passion about the object of faith; and, on the scale of integrity and logic consistency, the science-wealthy evolutionism married to mysticism stands lower than creationism.
Twenty years ago, I published a paper explaining my hypothesis of the origin of life on Earth and presenting a molecular model of a protobiont, a hypothetical earliest ancestor of the biological cell. The paper was published in a collection of articles on evolution of bacteria, by the Center for Biological Research in Pushchino of the then USSR Academy of Sciences. Recently, having stumbled upon a few research papers dealing with the problem of the origin of life on Earth, I went on to see what has changed in general in this field within the past twenty years and have found out that there was nothing new. This has been a good stimulus for me to finally get to translate my 1984 paper into English and post it on this web site. Back then, I had every reason to muse on the role of lipids in the functioning of live organisms. Due to my years-long work in express
identification of bacteria, I had had an opportunity to investigate the fatty acid (and occasionally phospholipid) composition of over 33,000 strains of bacteria.
( Read more... )
