Loading of Amino Acids onto RNA in a Putative RNA‐Peptide World

Singer, Johannes N.; Müller, Felix M.; Węgrzyn, Ewa; Hölzl, Christina; Hurmiz, Hans; Liu, Chuyi; Escobar, Luis und Carell, Thomas (15. Mai 2023): Loading of Amino Acids onto RNA in a Putative RNA‐Peptide World. In: Angewandte Chemie International Edition, Bd. 62, Nr. 21, e202302360

Abstract

RNA is a molecule that can both store genetic information and perform catalytic reactions. This observed dualism places RNA into the limelight of concepts about the origin of life. The RNA world concept argues that life started from self-replicating RNA molecules, which evolved toward increasingly complex structures. Recently, we demonstrated that RNA, with the help of conserved non-canonical nucleosides, which are also putative relics of an early RNA world, had the ability to grow peptides covalently connected to RNA nucleobases, creating RNA-peptide chimeras. It is conceivable that such molecules, which combined the information-coding properties of RNA with the catalytic potential of amino acid side chains, were once the structures from which life emerged. Herein, we report prebiotic chemistry that enabled the loading of both nucleosides and RNAs with amino acids as the first step toward RNA-based peptide synthesis in a putative RNA-peptide world.

• Dokumententyp: Zeitschriftenartikel
• EU Funded Grant Agreement Number: 741912
• EU-Projekte: Horizon 2020 > ERC Grants > ERC Advanced Grant > ERC Grant 741912: EPiR - The Chemical Basis of RNA Epigenetics
• Publikationsform: Publisher's Version
• Fakultät: Chemie und Pharmazie > Department Chemie
• Themengebiete: 500 Naturwissenschaften und Mathematik > 540 Chemie
• Sprache: Englisch
• DFG: Gefördert durch die Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - 326039064
• DFG: Gefördert durch die Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - 325871075
• DFG: Gefördert durch die Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - 201269156
• DFG: Gefördert durch die Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - 393547839