Adsorption and condensation of amino acids and nucleotides with soluble mineral salts
The directed synthesis of biopolymers in an abiotic environment is presumably a cyclic sequence of steps which may be realized in a fluctuating environment such as a prebiotic pond undergoing wetting-drying cycles. Soluble mineral salts have been proposed as an essential component of this fluctuating environment. The following sequence may be considered as a most primitive mechanism of information transfer in a fluctuating environment: (1) adsorption of a biomolecule onto a soluable mineral salt surface to act as an adsorbed template; (2) specific adsorption of biomonomers onto the adsorbed template; (3) condensation of the adsorbed biomonomers; and (4) desorption of the elongated oligomer. In this investigation, the salts selected for study were CaSO4.2H2O(gypsum), SrSO4, and several other metal sulfates and chlorides. Adsorption of the monomeric species, gly, 5'AMP 5'GMP, and 5'CMP was investigated. The adsorbed template biopolymers used were Poly-A, Poly-G, Poly-C, and Poly-U. The results of studies involving these experimental participants, the first two steps of the proposed primitive information transfer mechanism, and condensation of amino acids to form oligomers in a fluctuating environment are to be reported.