ArticleTrends in genetics : TIG2005
On the origin of genomes and cells within inorganic compartments.
Article in Trends in genetics : TIG, 2005. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 152 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
152 citing papers in PubMed.
- A Hadean timeline for the emergence of the RNA World.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Functional abiotic metabolite assembly hypothesis for the early events in the origin of life.Nature communications · 2026Review
- The Emergence of Life in the Light of Evolution.ArXiv · 2026Article
- Experimental evolution toward extinction in a molecular host-parasite system.Molecular biology and evolution · 2026Article
- Viruses in Extreme Marine Environments and Their Potential Existence in Extraterrestrial Environments.Viruses · 2026Review
- Antagonistic effects of amino acids support abiotic nano-environments in clay.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Abyssal hydrothermal alteration drives the evolution from simple alkanes to prebiotic molecular complexity.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Reassessing Viral Origins: From Escaped Genes to Degenerated Microbes.Pathogens (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Review
- Reconstituting alternative life using the test-bed of cell-free systems.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Review
- The dynamics of prebiotic take-off: the transfer of functional RNA communities from mineral surfaces to vesicles.Communications biology · 2025Article
- Review
- The Origin(s) of LUCA: Computer Simulation of a New Theory.Life (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Extremophilic Microorganisms as a Source of Emerging Enzymes for the Food Industry: A Review.Food science & nutrition · 2025Review
- The Possible Crystallization Process in the Origin of Bacteria, Archaea, Viruses, and Mobile Elements.Biology · 2024Article
- Antisense transcription is associated with expression of metal resistance determinants in Cupriavidus metallidurans CH34.Metallomics : integrated biometal science · 2024Article
- In the Beginning: Let Hydration Be Coded in Proteins for Manifestation and Modulation by Salts and Adenosine Triphosphate.International journal of molecular sciences · 2024Review
- Evolution of Cellular Organization Along the First Branches of the Tree of Life.Journal of molecular evolution · 2024Article
- The Archaeal Cell Cycle.Annual review of cell and developmental biology · 2024Review
- RNA or DNA? Revisiting the Chemical Nature of the Cenancestral Genome.Journal of molecular evolution · 2024Article
- The Last Universal Common Ancestor of Ribosome-Encoding Organisms: Portrait of LUCA.Journal of molecular evolution · 2024Review
92 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Building on the model of Russell and Hall for the emergence of life at a warm submarine hydrothermal vent, we suggest that, within a hydrothermally formed system of contiguous iron-sulfide (FeS) compartments, populations of virus-like RNA molecules, which eventually encoded one or a few proteins each, became the agents of both variation and selection. The initial darwinian selection was for molecular self-replication. Combinatorial sorting of genetic elements among compartments would have resulted in preferred proliferation and selection of increasingly complex molecular ensembles--those compartment contents that achieved replication advantages. The last universal common ancestor (LUCA) we propose was not free-living but an inorganically housed assemblage of expressed and replicable genetic elements. The evolution of the enzymatic systems for (i) DNA replication; and (ii) membrane and cell wall biosynthesis, enabled independent escape of the first archaebacterial and eubacterial cells from their hydrothermal hatchery, within which the LUCA itself remained confined.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.