Description
A reconceptualization of origins research that exploits a modern understanding of non-covalent molecular forces that stabilize living prokaryotic cells.
Scientific research into the origins of life remains exploratory and speculative. Science has no definitive answer to the biggest questions--"What is life?" and "How did life begin on earth?" In this book, Jan Spitzer reconceptualizes origins research by exploiting a modern understanding of non-covalent molecular forces and covalent bond formation--a physicochemical approach propounded originally by Linus Pauling and Max Delbrück. Spitzer develops the Pauling-Delbrück premise as a physicochemical jigsaw puzzle that identifies key stages in life's emergence, from the formation of first oceans, tidal sediments, and proto-biofilms to progenotes, proto-cells and the first cellular organisms.
Table of Contents
Series Foreword xv
A Note about This “Story” xvii
Preface xix
Acknowledgments xxv
Introduction: A Physicochemical Framework for Origins Research 1
1 Understanding Biological Matter 19
2 Defining the Origins Problem 31
3 Structured Bacterial Life: No Bag of Enzymes 53
4 Bacterial Non-covalent Forces and Phase Separation 65
5 Bacterial Crowding and Vectorial Organization 85
6 The Jigsaw Puzzle Pieces 103
7 The Physicochemical Roots of Darwinian Evolution 129
8 An Unexplored Experimental Paradigm of Cyclic Processes 141
Summary 157
Appendix: Screened Electrostatic Interactions in Crowded Colloidal Systems 165
Notes 171
References 191
Index 217
