Prebiotic synthesis of α-amino acids and orotate from α-ketoacids potentiates transition to extant metabolic pathways.

The Strecker reaction of aldehydes is the pre-eminent pathway to explain the prebiotic origins of α-amino acids. However, biology employs transamination of α-ketoacids to synthesize amino acids which are then transformed to nucleobases, implying an evolutionary switch-abiotically or biotically-of a prebiotic pathway involving the Strecker reaction into today's biosynthetic pathways. Here we show that α-ketoacids react with cyanide and ammonia sources to form the corresponding α-amino acids through the Bucherer-Bergs pathway.

Synthesis and hydrolytic stability of cyclic phosphatidic acids: implications for synthetic- and proto-cell studies.

Cyclic phosphatidic acids (cPAs) are bioactive compounds with therapuetic potential, but are in short supply. We describe a robust synthesis of cPAs employing an efficient cyclophosphorylation procedure and report on their hydrolytic properties - which should facilitate the study of their biological properties and as plausible proto- and synthetic-cell components.

Cyanide as a primordial reductant enables a protometabolic reductive glyoxylate pathway.

Investigation of prebiotic metabolic pathways is predominantly based on abiotically replicating the reductive citric acid cycle. While attractive from a parsimony point of view, attempts using metal/mineral-mediated reductions have produced complex mixtures with inefficient and uncontrolled reactions. Here we show that cyanide acts as a mild and efficient reducing agent mediating abiotic transformations of tricarboxylic acid intermediates and derivatives.

Synthesis of propellanes containing a bicyclo[2.2.2]octene unit the Diels-Alder reaction and ring-closing metathesis as key steps.

The synthesis of propellanes containing bicyclo[2.2.2]octene olefin metathesis approach is less explored.