A viscous solvent enables information transfer from gene-length nucleic acids in a model prebiotic replication cycle.
Nat Chem
; 9(4): 318-324, 2017 04.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-28338690
ABSTRACT
Many hypotheses concerning the nature of early life assume that genetic information was once transferred through the template-directed synthesis of RNA, before the emergence of coded enzymes. However, attempts to demonstrate enzyme-free, template-directed synthesis of nucleic acids have been limited by 'strand inhibition', whereby transferring information from a template strand in the presence of its complementary strand is inhibited by the stability of the template duplex. Here, we use solvent viscosity to circumvent strand inhibition, demonstrating information transfer from a gene-length template (>300â
nt) within a longer (545â
bp or 3â
kb) duplex. These results suggest that viscous environments on the prebiotic Earth, generated periodically by water evaporation, could have facilitated nucleic acid replication-particularly of long, structured sequences such as ribozymes. Our approach works with DNA and RNA, suggesting that viscosity-mediated replication is possible for a range of genetic polymers, perhaps even for informational polymers that may have preceded RNA.
Texto completo:
1
Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Solventes
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DNA
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RNA
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Origem da Vida
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Modelos Genéticos
Idioma:
En
Ano de publicação:
2017
Tipo de documento:
Article