Origins of life: The Protein Folding Problem all over again?

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Kocher, Charles D.; Dill, Ken A.
• 署名单位: State University of New York (SUNY) System; Stony Brook University; State University of New York (SUNY) System; Stony Brook University; State University of New York (SUNY) System; Stony Brook University
• 刊物名称: PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0027-12084
• DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2315000121
• 发表日期: 2024-08-13
• 关键词: hydrogen-exchange; tertiary structure; bond formation; amino-acids; rna; core; MODEL; polypeptide; mechanics; stabilize

摘要

How did specific useful protein sequences arise from simpler molecules at the origin of life? This seemingly needle-in-a-haystack problem has remarkably close resemblance to the old Protein Folding Problem, for which the solution is now known from statistical physics. Based on the logic that Origins must have come only after there was an operative evolution mechanism-which selects on phenotype, not genotype-we give a perspective that proteins and their folding processes are likely to have been the primary driver of the early stages of the origin of life.