Self-Replicating Chemicals Evolve Into Lifelike Ecosystem -
11:43 AM - Categories: Genetics Life makes more of itself. And
now so can a set of custom-designed chemicals. Chemists have
shown that a group of synthetic enzymes replicated, competed and
evolved much like a natural ecosystem, but without life or
cells. "So long as you provide the building blocks and the
starter seed, it goes forever," said Gerald Joyce, a chemist at
the Scripps Research Institute and co-author of the paper
published Thursday in Science. "It is immortalized molecular
information." Joyce’s chemicals are technically hacked RNA
enzymes, much like the ones we have in our bodies, but they
don’t behave anything like those in living creatures. But, these
synthetic RNA replicators do provide a model for evolution — and
shed light on one step in the development of early living
systems from on a lifeless globe. Scientists believe that early
life on Earth was much more primitive than what we see around us
today. It probably didn’t use DNA like