#  Origins Forum -Interactions between fatty acids and building blocks of RNA and peptides- Sarah Keller (University of Washington) 

 



####  calendar\_today Date and Time 

 **March 11, 2015** 

 04:00PM - 04:00PM EDT 

####  pin\_drop Location 

 **Haller Hall (Room 102), Geological Museum, 24 Oxford Street**  



 

 



 

Abstract: How did molecules on the early Earth assemble into storehouses of  
information (RNA) and machinery (proteins) surrounded by a membrane? The  
membrane is the most readily explained component because prebiotic fatty  
acids (such as decanoic acid) self-assemble in water into vesicles.  
However, bare fatty acid vesicles flocculate in the presence of salt  
water. Major questions in the Origins of Life field have therefore  
included how the four bases and the sugar in RNA were selected from a  
mixture of prebiotic compounds and how fatty acid vesicles were stabilized  
against flocculation. Our group recently provided plausible answers to  
these questions with our discoveries that nucleobases (as well as some,  
but not all, related bases) and ribose bind to decanoic acid aggregates  
\[Black et al. PNAS 110, 13272 (2013)\] and that this binding inhibits  
flocculation of decanoic acid vesicles by salt. Our more recent results  
suggest that the building blocks of proteins (amino acids) also stabilize  
fatty acid membranes against salt-induced flocculation. Our results are  
consistent with a scenario in which aggregates of fatty acids  
self-assembled with the building blocks of RNA and of peptides on the  
early Earth, and in which interactions among these components led to  
stable membranes and the formation of the two biopolymers.

<http://depts.washington.edu/chem/people/faculty/keller.html>



 

 



 

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