Journal
NATURE ECOLOGY & EVOLUTION
Volume 3, Issue 12, Pages 1715-+Publisher
NATURE PORTFOLIO
DOI: 10.1038/s41559-019-1018-8
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Funding
- Directorates for Biological Sciences and Geosciences at the National Science Foundation [80NSSC17K0295, 80NSSC17K0296, 1724150]
- NASA [80NSSC17K0295, 80NSSC17K0296, 1724150]
- National Science Foundation [1457695, NSFOCE-BSF 1635070]
- Human Frontiers Science Programme [RGP0020/2016]
- Boston University Hariri Institute for Computing and Computational Science and Engineering
- Direct For Biological Sciences
- Emerging Frontiers [1724150] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
- Division Of Environmental Biology
- Direct For Biological Sciences [1457695] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
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It has been suggested that a deep memory of early life is hidden in the architecture of metabolic networks, whose reactions could have been catalyzed by small molecules or minerals before genetically encoded enzymes. A major challenge in unravelling these early steps is assessing the plausibility of a connected, thermodynamically consistent proto-metabolism under different geochemical conditions, which are still surrounded by high uncertainty. Here we combine network-based algorithms with physico-chemical constraints on chemical reaction networks to systematically show how different combinations of parameters (temperature, pH, redox potential and availability of molecular precursors) could have affected the evolution of a proto-metabolism. Our analysis of possible trajectories indicates that a subset of boundary conditions converges to an organo-sulfur-based proto-metabolic network fuelled by a thioester- and redox-driven variant of the reductive tricarboxylic acid cycle that is capable of producing lipids and keto acids. Surprisingly, environmental sources of fixed nitrogen and low-potential electron donors are not necessary for the earliest phases of biochemical evolution. We use one of these networks to build a steady-state dynamical metabolic model of a protocell, and find that different combinations of carbon sources and electron donors can support the continuous production of a minimal ancient 'biomass' composed of putative early biopolymers and fatty acids.
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