Publications by authors named "Heather Abbott-Lyon"
Article Synopsis
- - Reduced oxidation state phosphorus compounds may have originated from meteorites or geological processes, and they could be crucial for forming biological phosphorus compounds due to their higher solubility and reactivity compared to traditional phosphorus forms.
- - This study explores the reactions of these reduced phosphorus compounds with nucleosides like uridine and adenosine, showing that they can create organophosphites and organophosphates through one-pot syntheses, aided by NH ions and urea.
- - The findings suggest implications for discovering organic compounds in environments like Mars and early Earth, where conditions had more water (HO) than oxygen (O), and propose a natural phosphorus cycle that could lead to the formation of secondary phosphate minerals.
The element phosphorus (P) is central to ecosystem growth and is proposed to be a limiting nutrient for life. The Archean ocean may have been strongly phosphorus-limited due to the selective binding of phosphate to iron oxyhydroxide. Here we report a new route to solubilizing phosphorus in the ancient oceans: reduction of phosphate to phosphite by iron(II) at low (<200 °C) diagenetic temperatures.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWe present a study of the reactions of the meteoritic mineral schreibersite (Fe,Ni)3P, focusing primarily on surface chemistry and prebiotic phosphorylation. In this work, a synthetic analogue of the mineral was synthesized by mixing stoichiometric proportions of elemental iron, nickel and phosphorus and heating in a tube furnace at 820 °C for approximately 235 hours under argon or under vacuum, a modification of the method of Skála and Drábek (2002). Once synthesized, the schreibersite was characterized to confirm the identity of the product as well as to elucidate the oxidation processes affecting the surface.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWe have developed a multimodal ion source design that can be configured on the fly for various analysis modes, designed for more efficient and reproducible sampling at the mass spectrometer atmospheric pressure (AP) interface in a number of different applications. This vacuum-assisted plasma ionization (VaPI) source features interchangeable transmission mode and laser ablation sampling geometries. Operating in both AC and DC power regimes with similar results, the ion source was optimized for parameters including helium flow rate and gas temperature using transmission mode to analyze volatile standards and drug tablets.
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