Dresden 2017 – wissenschaftliches Programm
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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik
BP 58: DNA & RNA
BP 58.5: Vortrag
Freitag, 24. März 2017, 10:30–10:45, ZEU 250
Organization of Nucleotides in Different Environments: Implications for the Formation of First RNA under Prebiotic Conditions — •Sebastian Himbert1,2 and Maikel Rheinstädter1 — 1Department of Physics and Astronomy, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada — 2Department of Experimental Physics, Saarland University, Saarbrücken, Germany
How nucleic acids first assembled and then incorporated into the earliest forms of cellular life 4 billion years ago remains a fundamental question of biology. There has been no obvious way for RNA-like molecules to be produced and then encapsulated in cellular compartments in the absence of enzymes and metabolism. To support the hypothesis that environmental conditions in the neighbourhood of volcanic hydrothermal springs could act to organize monomeric nucleotides through various noncovalent interactions and chemical reactions in the prebiotic era, we investigated 5'-adenosine monophosphate (AMP) and 5'-uridine monophosphate (UMP) molecules captured in different matrices that have been proposed to promote polymerization [1]. Two nucleotides signals were observed in our X-ray diffraction experiments, one corresponding to a nearest neighbour distance of around 4.6 Å attributed to nucleotides that form a disordered, glassy structure. A second, smaller distance of 3.45 Å agrees well with the distance between stacked base pairs in the RNA backbone, and was assigned to the formation of pre-polymers, i.e., the organization of nucleotides into stacks of about 10 monomers. [1] S. Himbert et. al., Scientific Reports, 6, 31285 (2016).