EAGER Collaborative Proposal: A microfluidic platform for the discovery of new, life-like chemical systems

通过这一奖项，化学系的生命过程化学项目资助了威斯康星大学麦迪逊分校的David Baum博士和伊利诺伊大学芝加哥分校的David Eddington博士开发一个微流控平台，用于发现新的、类似生命的化学系统。人们缺乏关于具有繁殖和进化能力的新的类生命化学系统如何出现的知识。研究人员正在开发一种设备来筛选复杂的化学混合物，以寻找能够在矿物表面生长并随着时间的推移进化出更有效生长的类似生命的系统。该项目的目标是发现新的类似生命的化学系统，这将促进对地球上生命起源的理解。这项研究的新实验方法被用来通过演讲让学生和公众参与进来。这项研究还与包括高中化学教师在内的不同化学家分享，以了解生命化学起源的性质。这项研究项目涉及建立一个简单的微流控设备和相关的实验范式，用于在矿物表面上条状流动复杂的化学混合物。这种表面包含可能的自催化循环的积木，以及无机或有机能源。在多天的实验窗口中，条纹在矿物表面上移动。这种实验安排使得能够选择能够沿着表面自我传播的吸附的自催化集。此外，如果这种自动催化系统中存在空间差异，该设备就会选择能够更快地定植新遇到的矿物的变种。在其他分析方法中，X射线光电子能谱用于检测吸附的碳或氮的浓度变化。这样的变化将表明对加强殖民和生长的选择的适应性反应。当检测到新的自催化化学体系时，表征它们的化学组成。

With this award, the Chemistry of Life Processes Program in the Chemistry Division is funding Dr. David Baum and collaborators from the University of Wisconsin - Madison and Dr. David Eddington from the University of Illinois - Chicago to develop a microfluidic platform for the discovery of new, life-like chemical systems. There is a lack of knowledge about how new life-like chemical systems, having the capacity for reproducing and evolving, can emerge. The researchers are developing a device to screen complex chemical mixtures in order to find life-like systems that can grow over a mineral surface and can evolve more efficient growth over time. The goal of the project is the discovery of new life-like chemical systems, which would advance the understanding of how life originated on earth. The new experimental approach of this research is used to engage students and the public through presentations. It is also shared with diverse chemists, including high-school chemistry teachers, in a citizen-science effort to understand the nature of life's chemical origins.This research project involves building a simple microfluidic device and an associated experimental paradigm for flowing a complex chemical mixture, in a stripe, over a mineral surface. This surface contains possible building blocks of autocatalytic cycles as well as inorganic or organic sources of energy. The stripe is displaced across the mineral surface over a multiple day experimental window. This experimental arrangement enables selection for adsorbed autocatalytic sets that can propagate themselves along the surface. Furthermore, if there is spatial variation in such autocatalytic systems, the device selects for variants that can more rapidly colonize newly encountered mineral. Among other analytical methods, X-ray photoemission spectroscopy is used to detect changes in the concentration of adsorbed carbon or nitrogen. Such changes would indicate an adaptive response to selection for enhanced colonization and growth. When new autocatalytic chemical systems are detected, their chemical composition is characterized.