Radiolysis generates a complex organosynthetic chemical network.

ABSTRACT: The architectural features of cellular life and its ecologies at larger scales are built upon foundational networks of reactions between molecules that avoid a collapse to equilibrium. The search for life's origins is, in some respects, a search for biotic network attributes in abiotic chemical systems. Radiation chemistry has long been employed to model prebiotic reaction networks, and here we report network-level analyses carried out on a compiled database of radiolysis reactions, acquired by the scientific community over decades of research. The resulting network shows robust connections between abundant geochemical reservoirs and the production of carboxylic acids, amino acids, and ribonucleotide precursors-the chemistry of which is predominantly dependent on radicals. Moreover, the ne

SUBMITTER: Adam ZR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7813863 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature