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Chemistry Inside Vesicles Driven by Mineral Particle Photocatalysis
PI: David Summers
In this proposal we expand upon our previous demonstration of the principle that encapsulation of colloidal semiconducting TiO2 particles inside vesicles can provide an energy transduction system that could have originated in the prebiotic/protocellular stage of the origin of life and which can drive the formation of biochemical species. For the next 3-year period, we intend to investigate how such a system can photosynthetically drive both enzymatic and prebiotic chemistry in general and how such energy transduction may have contributed to the origin of life and the emergence of metabolism.
From the wide range of chemistries that can be driven by such particles, we have focused on systems in which vesicles encapsulate chemistry that allows them to take photochemical energy and contribute to their own formation, stability, and growth, in this case by the formation of fatty acids. We will examine what other minerals might provide the same photocatalytic chemistry. We will also study how redox species/reactions inside vesicle wall might differ from the same reactions in solution, allow transport of redox equivalents across the vesicle membrane, and use vesicle properties to in protocellular systems.
The results of this work will provide a model of how prebiotic energy transduction developed and served as a precursor to metabolic systems and how metabolism could have developed in a vesicle based “protocellular origin of life”. It will help bridge gaps in our understanding of how prebiotic chemistry was able to develop into a system capable of harnessing energy and replicating itself. This work can advance our understanding of the origins of autotrophy and contribute to our general understanding of sources of prebiotic compounds.
May 16, 2012
