OoL digest — February 28st edition
This week we have 2 preprints and 10 new papers on the origin of life, coming from biochemistry, bioinformatics, biology and planetary science. Enjoy!
Biochemistry
Synthesis of Phospholipids Under Plausible Prebiotic Conditions and Analogies with Phospholipid Biochemistry for Origin of Life Studies – Fiore et al. – Astrobiology
Amino Acid Specificity of Ancestral Aminoacyl-tRNA Synthetase Prior to the Last Universal Common Ancestor Commonote commonote – Furukawa et al. – Journal of Molecular Evolution
Scaling laws in enzyme function reveal a new kind of biochemical universality – Gagler et al. – Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Reconstruction of nitrogenase predecessors suggests origin from maturase-like proteins – Garcia et al. – Genome Biology and Evolution
In vitro evolution reveals non-cationic protein-RNA interaction mediated by metal ions – Giacobelli et al. – Molecular Biology and Evolution
Micellar Composition Affects Lipid Accretion Kinetics in Molecular Dynamics Simulations – Kahana et al. – preprint
Chirality in Organic and Mineral Systems: A Review of Reactivity and Alteration Processes Relevant to Prebiotic Chemistry and Life Detection Missions – Lee et al. – Symmetry
Cyanide as a primordial reductant enables a protometabolic reductive glyoxylate pathway – Yadav et al. – Nature Chemistry
Bioinformatics
How evolution builds up complexity?: In vitro evolution approaches to witness complexification in artificial molecular replication systems – Furubayashi et al. – Biophysics and Physicobiology
Biology
Origin of eukaryotes: What can be learned from the first successfully isolated Asgard archaeon – Albers et al. – Faculty Reviews
An estimate of the deepest branches of the tree of life from ancient vertically-evolving genes – Moody et al. – eLife
Planetary Science
Orbital properties and implications for the initiation of plate tectonics and planetary habitability – Anand – preprint