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Coupled catabolism and anabolism in autocatalytic RNA sets

The ability to process molecules available in the environment into useable building blocks characterizes catabolism in contemporary cells and was probably critical for the initiation of life. Here we show that a catabolic process in collectively autocatalytic sets of RNAs allows diversified substrat...

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Autores principales: Arsène, Simon, Ameta, Sandeep, Lehman, Niles, Griffiths, Andrew D, Nghe, Philippe
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Oxford University Press 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6182175/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29982824
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/nar/gky598
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author Arsène, Simon
Ameta, Sandeep
Lehman, Niles
Griffiths, Andrew D
Nghe, Philippe
author_facet Arsène, Simon
Ameta, Sandeep
Lehman, Niles
Griffiths, Andrew D
Nghe, Philippe
author_sort Arsène, Simon
collection PubMed
description The ability to process molecules available in the environment into useable building blocks characterizes catabolism in contemporary cells and was probably critical for the initiation of life. Here we show that a catabolic process in collectively autocatalytic sets of RNAs allows diversified substrates to be assimilated. We modify fragments of the Azoarcus group I intron and find that the system is able to restore the original native fragments by a multi-step reaction pathway. This allows in turn the formation of catalysts by an anabolic process, eventually leading to the accumulation of ribozymes. These results demonstrate that rudimentary self-reproducing RNA systems based on recombination possess an inherent capacity to assimilate an expanded repertoire of chemical resources and suggest that coupled catabolism and anabolism could have arisen at a very early stage in primordial living systems.
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spelling pubmed-61821752018-10-18 Coupled catabolism and anabolism in autocatalytic RNA sets Arsène, Simon Ameta, Sandeep Lehman, Niles Griffiths, Andrew D Nghe, Philippe Nucleic Acids Res RNA and RNA-protein complexes The ability to process molecules available in the environment into useable building blocks characterizes catabolism in contemporary cells and was probably critical for the initiation of life. Here we show that a catabolic process in collectively autocatalytic sets of RNAs allows diversified substrates to be assimilated. We modify fragments of the Azoarcus group I intron and find that the system is able to restore the original native fragments by a multi-step reaction pathway. This allows in turn the formation of catalysts by an anabolic process, eventually leading to the accumulation of ribozymes. These results demonstrate that rudimentary self-reproducing RNA systems based on recombination possess an inherent capacity to assimilate an expanded repertoire of chemical resources and suggest that coupled catabolism and anabolism could have arisen at a very early stage in primordial living systems. Oxford University Press 2018-10-12 2018-07-03 /pmc/articles/PMC6182175/ /pubmed/29982824 http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/nar/gky598 Text en © The Author(s) 2018. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. For commercial re-use, please contact journals.permissions@oup.com
spellingShingle RNA and RNA-protein complexes
Arsène, Simon
Ameta, Sandeep
Lehman, Niles
Griffiths, Andrew D
Nghe, Philippe
Coupled catabolism and anabolism in autocatalytic RNA sets
title Coupled catabolism and anabolism in autocatalytic RNA sets
title_full Coupled catabolism and anabolism in autocatalytic RNA sets
title_fullStr Coupled catabolism and anabolism in autocatalytic RNA sets
title_full_unstemmed Coupled catabolism and anabolism in autocatalytic RNA sets
title_short Coupled catabolism and anabolism in autocatalytic RNA sets
title_sort coupled catabolism and anabolism in autocatalytic rna sets
topic RNA and RNA-protein complexes
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6182175/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29982824
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/nar/gky598
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