Computer Simulation Of Protocells' Membrane-Takeover During The Origin Of Life

The cell membrane is a key part of protocells.The membrane provides a "compartment" that closely links genetic material and metabolic machinery,and constitutes the most basic unit of life.The cell membranes of all living organisms are composed of phospholipids.The current mainstream research on the origin of life believes that the most protocells' membranes may be formed by single-chain amphiphilic molecules existing in prebiotic environments,while in protocells and modern cells There is a transition state in between,the main feature is that the membrane of transition state cells is a simple mixed membrane composed of phospholipids and fatty acids.As the origin of life remains a highly speculative field lacking fossil evidence,human knowledge of prebiotic chemistry and a basic understanding of the nature of life is insufficient.In this context,computer simulations are expected to play an important role,and the construction of protocells models has the potential to help us further understand the origin of life in the laboratory.This paper presents experiments to simulate in silico the evolution of protocells' membrane amphiphiles from fatty acids to phospholipids.This paper describes the use of computer simulations to study the evolution of amphiphilic molecules from fatty acids to phospholipids in the membranes of primitive cells.The simulation used a probabilistic Monte Carlo model-based protocells' model to simulate the evolution of the RNA world on mineral surfaces,by simulating random events in the primitive Earth environment by relative probabilities based on deterministic rules to achieve the rare event of the origin of life in a computer.Mineral surfaces are often considered to be the site of key processes in the origin of life,as they aggregate,concentrate,organize,and protect biopolymers,and are the first choice for simulating pristine environments.Simulation results show that phospholipid synthesis ribozymes have a significant effect on the average size of protocells in the system.At the same time,if the compensatory mechanism represented by osmotic compensatory ribozymes is to gain the advantages of Darwinian evolution,both phospholipid synthesis ribozymes and osmotic inhibition mechanisms are required to exist at the same time,which means that phospholipid synthases have a high probability of appearing before osmotic compensatory enzymes.Protocells possessing nucleotide synthesis ribozymes,phospholipid synthases and osmotic compensatory enzymes at the same time and using phospholipids as the main components of the cell membrane were selected in the system and became the dominant populations,namely the winners of Darwinian evolution.