US-Sweden Cooperative Science: Oligonucleotide Synthesis on Minerals

该奖项将支持伦斯勒理工学院的James P. Ferris教授和斯德哥尔摩大学的Nils G. Holm博士之间的合作研究，旨在了解地球上生命的起源。特别是，各种矿物作为催化剂的作用，在接近原始地球上可能存在的条件下形成rna样聚合物将被研究。在原始地球上，含铁矿物可能是这种聚合物形成的催化剂，本研究将研究这些矿物催化磷酸酯键形成的有效性。霍尔姆博士早期的工作是作为地质化学家；他将准备矿物并确认其结构。化学家费里斯教授将研究它们的催化性能。该项目汇集了化学和地质学科；Ferris教授是前生物有机反应和在第一个生命系统中很重要的有机结构类型方面的专家，他将与地质环境和这些环境中可能的反应条件方面的专家合作。这项研究的结果应该是鉴定出一组矿物，这些矿物可能是原始地球上生命起源所必需的结构形成的重要催化剂。

This award will support collaborative research between Professor James P. Ferris, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and Dr. Nils G. Holm, University of Stockholm, in studies aimed at understanding the beginnings of life on earth. In particular, the role of various minerals serving as catalysts for the formation of RNA-like polymers under conditions approximating those that may have existed on the primitive earth will be investigated. Iron-containing minerals were likely catalysts for the formation of such polymers on the primitive earth, and this research will study how effectively such minerals catalyze the formation of the phosphate ester bond. Dr. Holm's earlier work has been as a geological chemist; he will prepare the minerals and confirm their structure. Prof. Ferris, a chemist, will investigate their catalytic properties. This project brings together the chemical and geological disciplines; Prof. Ferris, an expert in pre-biological organic reactions and in the types of organic structures that would have been important in the first living systems, will work with an expert in geological environments and the possible reaction conditions in those environments. This research should result in the identification of a set of minerals which may have been important catalysts for the formation of structures essential to the origin of life on the primitive earth.