Digging up the roots of life
Article Abstract:
A phylogenetic tree drawn by comparing genes from 15 phylogenetic groups shows that bacteria diverged from Archaea and eukaryotes almost 1.8 Gyr ago. The tree was drawn by marking the dates when the seven main animal lineages appeared against adjusted gene sequence divergences at the corresponding branching points. However, the divergence is generally considered to have taken place almost 3.5 Gyr ago. The difference in the dates is probably due to a difference in the construction of the phylogenetic trees.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 1996
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Life at the margins
Article Abstract:
Experimental analysis of the possible prebiotic synthesis of the coenzyme pantetheine shows that pantetheine can be synthesized by heating its water-soluble component molecules, pantoyl lactone, beta-alanine and cysteamine. The biologically active pantetheine could have formed in the sunbaked sludge on drying pools and at lagoon margins. The experiment failed to convert pantetheine to the nucleotide derivative dephosphocoenzyme A upon heating with ATP or ADP.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 1995
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A plausibly prebiotic synthesis of phosphonic acids
Article Abstract:
Ultraviolet irradiation of orthophosphorous acid in the presence of primary alcohols, aldehydes or acetones produces phosphonic acids. Reactions of a similar type may account for the occurrence of phosphonic acids in the Murchison meteorite. Phosphonic acids may also have been formed through the production of phosphite radicals near the surface regions of the meteorite parent body.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 1995
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