Keck Research Laboratory at the University of Hawaii at Manoa
All living things need cells and energy for duplication. Without these fundamental building blocks, living organisms on Earth cannot reproduce themselves and continue to exist. On the key element of the building blocks of life (phosphates) so far little information.
Representatives from the University of Hawaii at Manoa provided compelling new evidence that this component of life was created in outer space and arrived on Earth in the first billion years using meteorites or comets. Then phosphorus compounds were incorporated into biomolecules found in the cells of living beings of our planet.
New research “Interstellar synthesis of phosphorus oxo acids” indicates that phosphates and diphosphoric acid are the two main elements necessary for building blocks in molecular biology. These are the main components of chromosomes - carriers of genetic information in which DNA was found.
Interstellar Replication
Comet 67P / Churyumov-Gerasimenko
In an ultrahigh-voltage vacuum chamber cooled to -450 ° C, a team of scientists in the Keck Laboratory managed to reproduce interstellar ice grains covered with carbon dioxide and water, which are ubiquitous in cold molecular clouds and phosphine. When exposed to ionizing radiation in the form of high-energy electrons to simulate cosmic rays in space using non-equilibrium reactions, it was possible to synthesize numerous phosphoric oxo acids, like phosphoric acid and diphosphoric acid. On Earth, phosphine is lethal to living beings. However, in the interstellar medium, its exotic chemistry can contribute to the emergence of rare chemical reaction pathways in order to initiate the formation of biorelevant molecules, such as phosphorus oxoacid, which, as a result, can cause the known molecular evolution of life.
Phosphorus oxo acids obtained in experiments by combining complex analytical materials involving lasers connected to mass spectrometers along with gas chromatographs could also be formed in comets, like 67P / Churyumov-Gerasimenko, which contains phosphorus (considered to be a source of phosphine).
Upon delivery to Earth by meteorites or comets, these phosphorus oxo acids could be available for the prebiotic chemistry of phosphorus on our planet. As a result, an understanding of the light synthesis of these oxo acids is important for understanding the origin of water-soluble prebiotic phosphorus compounds and how they could be included in organisms not only on Earth, but throughout the Universe.
