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Martínez RF, Cuccia LA, Viedma C, Cintas P. On the Origin of Sugar Handedness: Facts, Hypotheses and Missing Links-A Review. ORIGINS LIFE EVOL B 2022; 52:21-56. [PMID: 35796896 DOI: 10.1007/s11084-022-09624-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/05/2022] [Accepted: 05/24/2022] [Indexed: 11/30/2022]
Abstract
By paraphrasing one of Kipling's most amazing short stories (How the Leopard Got His Spots), this article could be entitled "How Sugars Became Homochiral". Obviously, we have no answer to this still unsolved mystery, and this perspective simply brings recent models, experiments and hypotheses into the homochiral homogeneity of sugars on earth. We shall revisit the past and current understanding of sugar chirality in the context of prebiotic chemistry, with attention to recent developments and insights. Different scenarios and pathways will be discussed, from the widely known formose-type processes to less familiar ones, often viewed as unorthodox chemical routes. In particular, problems associated with the spontaneous generation of enantiomeric imbalances and the transfer of chirality will be tackled. As carbohydrates are essential components of all cellular systems, astrochemical and terrestrial observations suggest that saccharides originated from environmentally available feedstocks. Such substances would have been capable of sustaining autotrophic and heterotrophic mechanisms integrating nutrients, metabolism and the genome after compartmentalization. Recent findings likewise indicate that sugars' enantiomeric bias may have emerged by a transfer of chirality mechanisms, rather than by deracemization of sugar backbones, yet providing an evolutionary advantage that fueled the cellular machinery.
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Affiliation(s)
- R Fernando Martínez
- Departamento de Química Orgánica E Inorgánica, Facultad de Ciencias, and Instituto Universitario de Investigación del Agua, Cambio Climático Y Sostenibilidad, (IACYS), Universidad de Extremadura, Avenida de Elvas s/n, 06006, Badajoz, Spain.
| | - Louis A Cuccia
- Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Quebec Centre for Advanced Materials (QCAM/CQMF), FRQNT, Concordia University, 7141 Sherbrooke St. West, Montreal, QC, H4B 1R6, Canada
| | - Cristóbal Viedma
- Department of Crystallography and Mineralogy, University Complutense, 28040, Madrid, Spain
| | - Pedro Cintas
- Departamento de Química Orgánica E Inorgánica, Facultad de Ciencias, and Instituto Universitario de Investigación del Agua, Cambio Climático Y Sostenibilidad, (IACYS), Universidad de Extremadura, Avenida de Elvas s/n, 06006, Badajoz, Spain.
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Samuilov AY, Samuilov YD. Catalysis and autocatalysis in urea methanolysis with formation of O-methyl carbamate: A DFT study. Chem Phys Lett 2022. [DOI: 10.1016/j.cplett.2021.139196] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/17/2022]
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Frenkel-Pinter M, Rajaei V, Glass JB, Hud NV, Williams LD. Water and Life: The Medium is the Message. J Mol Evol 2021; 89:2-11. [PMID: 33427903 PMCID: PMC7884305 DOI: 10.1007/s00239-020-09978-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/23/2020] [Accepted: 11/21/2020] [Indexed: 02/06/2023]
Abstract
Water, the most abundant compound on the surface of the Earth and probably in the universe, is the medium of biology, but is much more than that. Water is the most frequent actor in the chemistry of metabolism. Our quantitation here reveals that water accounts for 99.4% of metabolites in Escherichia coli by molar concentration. Between a third and a half of known biochemical reactions involve consumption or production of water. We calculated the chemical flux of water and observed that in the life of a cell, a given water molecule frequently and repeatedly serves as a reaction substrate, intermediate, cofactor, and product. Our results show that as an E. coli cell replicates in the presence of molecular oxygen, an average in vivo water molecule is chemically transformed or is mechanistically involved in catalysis ~ 3.7 times. We conclude that, for biological water, there is no distinction between medium and chemical participant. Chemical transformations of water provide a basis for understanding not only extant biochemistry, but the origins of life. Because the chemistry of water dominates metabolism and also drives biological synthesis and degradation, it seems likely that metabolism co-evolved with biopolymers, which helps to reconcile polymer-first versus metabolism-first theories for the origins of life.
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Affiliation(s)
- Moran Frenkel-Pinter
- NASA Center for the Origins of Life, Atlanta, GA, USA
- NSF-NASA Center of Chemical Evolution, Atlanta, GA, USA
- School of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Georgia Institute of Technology, 315 Ferst Drive NW, Atlanta, GA, 30332-0400, USA
| | - Vahab Rajaei
- NASA Center for the Origins of Life, Atlanta, GA, USA
- NSF-NASA Center of Chemical Evolution, Atlanta, GA, USA
- School of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Georgia Institute of Technology, 315 Ferst Drive NW, Atlanta, GA, 30332-0400, USA
| | - Jennifer B Glass
- NASA Center for the Origins of Life, Atlanta, GA, USA
- School of Earth and Atmospheric Science, Georgia Institute of Technology, 311 Ferst Drive NW, Atlanta, GA, 30332-0340, USA
| | - Nicholas V Hud
- NASA Center for the Origins of Life, Atlanta, GA, USA
- NSF-NASA Center of Chemical Evolution, Atlanta, GA, USA
- School of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Georgia Institute of Technology, 315 Ferst Drive NW, Atlanta, GA, 30332-0400, USA
| | - Loren Dean Williams
- NASA Center for the Origins of Life, Atlanta, GA, USA.
- NSF-NASA Center of Chemical Evolution, Atlanta, GA, USA.
- School of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Georgia Institute of Technology, 315 Ferst Drive NW, Atlanta, GA, 30332-0400, USA.
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