We found a match
Your institution may have access to this item. Find your institution then sign in to continue.
- Title
Phosphorus: a Case for Mineral-Organic Reactions in Prebiotic Chemistry.
- Authors
Pasek, Matthew; Herschy, Barry; Kee, Terence
- Abstract
The ubiquity of phosphorus (P) in modern biochemistry suggests that P may have participated in prebiotic chemistry prior to the emergence of life. Of the major biogenic elements, phosphorus alone lacks a substantial volatile phase and its ultimate source therefore had to have been a mineral. However, as most native P minerals are chemically un-reactive within the temperature-pressure-pH regimes of contemporary life, it begs the question as to whether the most primitive early living systems on earth had access to a more chemically reactive P-mineral inventory. The meteoritic mineral schreibersite has been proposed as an important source of reactive P on the early earth. The chemistry of schreibersite as a P source is summarized and reviewed here. Recent work has also shown that reduced oxidation state P compounds were present on the early earth; these compounds lend credence to the relevance of schreibersite as a prebiotic mineral. Ultimately, schreibersite will oxidize to phosphate, but several high-energy P intermediates may have provided the reactive material necessary for incorporating P into prebiotic molecules.
- Subjects
PHOSPHORUS; SCHREIBERSITE; SURFACE chemistry; FREE radical reactions; PHOSPHORYLATION
- Publication
Origins of Life & Evolution of the Biosphere, 2015, Vol 45, Issue 1/2, p207
- ISSN
0169-6149
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1007/s11084-015-9420-y