Geophysical Laboratory, Carnegie Institution of Washington, Washington, DC 20015, USA.
Cold Spring Harb Perspect Biol. 2010 May;2(5):a002162. doi: 10.1101/cshperspect.a002162. Epub 2010 Apr 14.
Crystalline surfaces of common rock-forming minerals are likely to have played several important roles in life's geochemical origins. Transition metal sulfides and oxides promote a variety of organic reactions, including nitrogen reduction, hydroformylation, amination, and Fischer-Tropsch-type synthesis. Fine-grained clay minerals and hydroxides facilitate lipid self-organization and condensation polymerization reactions, notably of RNA monomers. Surfaces of common rock-forming oxides, silicates, and carbonates select and concentrate specific amino acids, sugars, and other molecular species, while potentially enhancing their thermal stabilities. Chiral surfaces of these minerals also have been shown to separate left- and right-handed molecules. Thus, mineral surfaces may have contributed centrally to the linked prebiotic problems of containment and organization by promoting the transition from a dilute prebiotic "soup" to highly ordered local domains of key biomolecules.
常见造岩矿物的晶体表面可能在生命的地球化学起源中发挥了几个重要作用。过渡金属硫化物和氧化物促进了多种有机反应，包括氮还原、氢甲酰化、氨化和费托合成。细粒粘土矿物和氢氧化物促进了脂质的自组织和缩聚反应，特别是 RNA 单体的反应。常见造岩氧化物、硅酸盐和碳酸盐的表面选择和浓缩特定的氨基酸、糖和其他分子种类，同时可能提高它们的热稳定性。这些矿物的手性表面还被证明可以分离左旋和右旋分子。因此，矿物表面可能通过促进从稀有的原始“汤”到关键生物分子的高度有序局部域的转变，为促进从稀有的原始“汤”到关键生物分子的高度有序局部域的转变，从而为包含和组织这两个与生命起源相关的问题做出了重要贡献。
