The Barrier and the Gradients to Drive the Growth of Proton Cells

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Long chain molecules are the easiest organic molecules to make under those conditions. They form what we optimistically call proto cells, a bilair membrane surrounding an aqueous space. If they just sit there and stick to the barrier, then whatever's crossing that barrier is going to go into the cells as well. The same gradients across the barrier and the cell can drive the growth of the cella. Can that cell now make two cells and so on? We've not really shown that yet, but impressiesand if it does, then you've effectively got the natural gradients driving the growth and replication of proto cels.

The origin of life here on Earth was an important and fascinating event, but it was also a long time ago and hasn’t left many pieces of direct evidence concerning what actually happened. One set of clues we have comes from processes in current living organisms, especially those processes that seem extremely common. The Krebs cycle, the sequence of reactions that functions as a pathway for energy distribution in aerobic organisms, is such an example. I talk with biochemist about the importance of the Krebs cycle to contemporary biology, as well as its possible significance in understanding the origin of life.

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Nick Lane received his PhD from the Royal Free Hospital Medical School. He is currently a professor of Evolutionary Biochemistry at University College London. He was a founding member of the UCL Consortium for Mitochondrial Research, and is Co-Director of the UCL Centre for Life’s Origin and Evolution. He was awarded the 2009 UCL Provost’s Venture Research Prize, the 2011 BMC Research Award for Genetics, Genomics, Bioinformatics and Evolution, the 2015 Biochemical Society Award, and the 2016 Royal Society Michael Faraday Prize and Lecture. His new book is Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death.

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