Enantiomeric excess of amino acids in hydrothermal environments

Selective adsorption and chiral amplification of amino acids in vermiculite clay-implications for the origin of biochirality

Smectite clays are hydrated layer silicates that, like micas, occur naturally in abundance. Importantly, they have readily modifiable interlayer spaces that provide excellent sites for nanochemistry. Vermiculite is one such smectite clay and in the presence of small chain-length alkyl-NH(3)Cl ions forms sensitive, 1-D ordered model clay systems with expandable nano-pore inter-layer regions. These inter-layers readily adsorb organic molecules. n-Propyl NH(3)Cl vermiculite clay gels were used to determine the adsorption of alanine, lysine and histidine by chiral HPLC. The results show that during reaction with fresh vermiculite interlayers, significant chiral enrichment of either L- and D-enantiomers occurs depending on the amino acid. Chiral enrichment of the supernatant solutions is up to about 1% per pass. In contrast, addition to clay interlayers already reacted with amino acid solutions resulted in little or no change in D/L ratio during the time of the experiment. Adsorption of small amounts of amphiphilic organic molecules in clay inter-layers is known to produce Layer-by-Layer or Langmuir-Blodgett films. Moreover atomistic simulations show that self-organization of organic species in clay interlayers is important. These non-centrosymmetric, chirally active nanofilms may cause clays to act subsequently as chiral amplifiers, concentrating organic material from dilute solution and having different adsorption energetics for D- and L-enantiomers. The additional role of clays in RNA oligomerization already postulated by Ferris and others, together with the need for the organization of amphiphilic molecules and lipids noted by Szostak and others, suggests that such chiral separation by clays in lagoonal environments at normal biological temperatures might also have played a significant role in the origin of biochirality.

Comments in a discussion: differential rates of D- and L-tyrosine crystallization

We earlier reported that we had observed quantifiable differences in crystallization rates of D and L tyrosine. It has been suggested that these results were due to the presence of impurities. Here we argue that it is premature to conclude that impurities entirely explain the results. More generally, there is an accumulating weight of evidence that D and L enantiomers display unexpected differences in their physical properties and behavior. These should be taken into account as we attempt to understand the origin of biochirality.

Uranyl Ion Complexation by Citric and Citramalic Acids in the Presence of Diamines

Uranyl nitrate reacts with citric (H4cit) or d-(-)-citramalic (H3citml) acids under mild hydrothermal conditions and in the presence of diamines to give different complexes which are all characterized by the presence of 2:2 uranyl/polycarboxylate dianionic dimers or of polymeric chains based on the same dimeric motif. Each uranium ion is chelated by the two ligands through the alkoxide and the alpha- or beta-carboxylate groups, the second beta-carboxylic group in citrate being uncoordinated. The uranium coordination sphere is completed by either a water molecule or the beta-carboxylate group of a neighboring unit, thus giving zero- or one-dimensional assemblages, respectively. The evidence for [UO2(Hcit)]2 dimers in the solid state confirms previous results from potentiometric and EXAFS measurements on solutions. Depending on the diamine used (DABCO, 2,2'- and 4,4'-bipyridine, [2.2.2]cryptand) and its ability to form divergent hydrogen bonds or not, different uranyl/polycarboxylate topologies are obtained, thus evidencing template effects, and extended hydrogen bonding gives two- or three-dimensional assemblages. These results, together with those previously obtained with NaOH as a base, add to the knowledge of the uranyl/citrate system, which is much investigated for its environmental relevance.

Evaluation of enantioselective gas chromatography for the determination of minute deviations from racemic composition of α-amino acids with emphasis on tyrosine: Accuracy and precision of the method

Whereas the determination of high enantiomeric fractions (EF) of chiral compounds is very well established, the accurate determination of small deviations from racemic compositions has not yet received much attention despite its relevance to studies dealing with the origin of homochirality, where only small initial enantiomeric bias is expected. Racemic samples of representative alpha-amino acids were derivatized as N-(O,S)-trifluoroacetyl/ethylesters and analyzed by enantioselective gas chromatography (GC) on fused silica capillaries coated with the chiral stationary phases (CSPs) Chirasil-D-Val, Chirasil-L-Val, and Lipodex E with GC/FID and GC/MS detection. The validation (accuracy and precision) of the determination of the enantiomeric fraction EF of the D-enantiomer in racemic or near-racemic compositions for 10 DL-alpha-amino acids obtained from commercial sources has been carried out. Emphasis is given to DL-tyrosine, the enantiomers of which have recently been claimed to show different crystallization properties. Values of EF obtained from GC measurements using CSPs were compared with those from CE using chiral mobile phase additives. While the precision of the GC method is generally better than 0.08% for all DL-alpha-amino acids studied, accuracy (trueness) of determination of amino acids with polar side chains is poorer than expected from the precision as a result of systematic errors. The accuracy determined relied on measurements on two oppositely configurated CSPs.