Nucleic acids bind to nanoparticulate iron (II) monosulphide in aqueous solutions

Hatton, Bryan and Rickard, David Terence ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4632-5711 2008. Nucleic acids bind to nanoparticulate iron (II) monosulphide in aqueous solutions. Origins of Life and Evolution of Biospheres 38 (3) , pp. 257-270. 10.1007/s11084-008-9132-7

Full text not available from this repository.

Abstract

In the hydrothermal FeS-world origin of life scenarios nucleic acids are suggested to bind to iron (II) monosulphide precipitated from the reaction between hydrothermal sulphidic vent solutions and iron-bearing oceanic water. In lower temperature systems, the first precipitate from this process is nanoparticulate, metastable FeSm with a mackinawite structure. Although the interactions between bulk crystalline iron sulphide minerals and nucleic acids have been reported, their reaction with nanoparticulate FeSm has not previously been investigated. We investigated the binding of different nucleic acids, and their constituents, to freshly precipitated, nanoparticulate FeSm. The degree to which the organic molecules interacted with FeSm is chromosomal DNA > RNA > oligomeric DNA > deoxadenosine monophosphate ≈ deoxyadenosine ≈ adenine. Although we found that FeSm does not fluoresce within the visible spectrum and there is no quantum confinement effect seen in the absorption, the mechanism of linkage of the FeSm to these biomolecules appears to be primarily electrostatic and similar to that found for the attachment of ZnS quantum dots. The results of a preliminary study of similar reactions with nanoparticulate CuS further supported the suggestion that the interaction mechanism was generic for nanoparticulate transition metal sulphides. In terms of the FeS-world hypothesis, the results of this study further support the idea that sulphide minerals precipitated at hydrothermal vents interact with biomolecules and could have assisted in the formation and polymerisation of nucleic acids.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Earth and Environmental Sciences
Subjects:	Q Science > QD Chemistry Q Science > QE Geology Q Science > QH Natural history > QH301 Biology
Uncontrolled Keywords:	DNA - Nanoparticles - Origin of life - Adsorption - Iron sulphide - UV/Vis spectroscopy
Publisher:	Springer
ISSN:	1573-0875
Last Modified:	18 Oct 2022 12:27
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/9865

Citation Data

Cited 21 times in Scopus. View in Scopus. Powered By Scopus® Data

Actions (repository staff only)

Edit Item