Kacser H, Beeby R. Evolution of catalytic proteins or on the origin of enzyme species by means of natural selection.
J Mol Evol 1984;
20:38-51. [PMID:
6429341 DOI:
10.1007/bf02101984]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 120] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/20/2023]
Abstract
It is believed that all present-day organisms descended from a common cellular ancestor. Such a cell must have evolved from more primitive and simpler precursors, but neither their organization nor the route such evolution took are accessible to the molecular techniques available today. We propose a mechanism, based on functional properties of enzymes and the kinetics of growth, which allows us to reconstruct the general course of early enzyme evolution. A precursor cell containing very few multifunctional enzymes with low catalytic activities is shown to lead inevitably to descendants with a large number of differentiated monofunctional enzymes with high turnover numbers. Mutation and natural selection for faster growth are shown to be the only conditions necessary for such a change to have occurred.
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