Origins of Life: The Protein Folding Problem all over again?

How did specific useful protein sequences arise from simpler molecules at the origin of life? This seemingly needle-in-a-haystack problem has remarkably close resemblance to the old Protein Folding Problem, for which the solution is now known from statistical physics. Based on the logic that Origins must have come only after there was an operative evolution mechanism-which selects on phenotype, not genotype-we give a perspective that proteins and their folding processes are likely to have been the primary driver of the early stages of the origin of life.

The prebiotic emergence of biological evolution.

The origin of life must have been preceded by Darwin-like evolutionary dynamics that could propagate it. How did that adaptive dynamics arise? And from what prebiotic molecules? Using evolutionary invasion analysis, we develop a universal framework for describing any origin story for evolutionary dynamics. We find that autocatalysts, i.

Darwinian evolution as a dynamical principle.

Darwinian evolution (DE)-biology's powerful process of adaptation-is remarkably different from other known dynamical processes. It is antithermodynamic, driving away from equilibrium; it has persisted for 3.5 billion years; and its target, fitness, can seem like "Just So" stories.