ArticleNature communications2024
Timing the evolution of phosphorus-cycling enzymes through geological time using phylogenomics.
Article in Nature communications, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 20 papers.
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Who cites it
20 citing papers in PubMed.
- Concurrent Phosphite Oxidation and Adenosine Phosphorylation Under Prebiotic Evaporative Conditions.Journal of molecular evolution · 2026Article
- Mafic-ultramafic igneous rocks as a source of reactive phosphorus for the origin of life.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Microbial phosphorus cycling in terrestrial ecosystems.Nature reviews. Microbiology · 2026Review
- Abiotic sources of fixed nitrogen sustained early ecosystems for several hundred million years after the origin of life.Science advances · 2026Article
- Lytic viruses drive the decrease in polyphosphate-accumulating and phosphate-solubilizing potential of microbial communities with increasing reservoir age.Applied and environmental microbiology · 2026Article
- Biological use of molybdenum and tungsten stems back to 3.4 billion years ago.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Lithosyntrophy: Obligate syntrophy in a phosphite-oxidizing, methanogenic culture.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Widespread promiscuous alkaline phosphatases underscore ancient microbial phosphite utilization.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- Experimental study on phosphorus removal performance from water by SW-ceramsite in a fixed-bed column.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Evolution of multicellularity genes in Cyanobacteria in the lead up to the great oxidation event.Communications biology · 2025Article
- Planetary sources of bio-essential nutrients on a prebiotic world.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Review
- Exploring productivity hotspots in the Precambrian biosphere.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Review
- DPANN Archaea and CPR Bacteria: insights into early cellular evolution?Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Review
- LucaPCycle: Illuminating microbial phosphorus cycling in deep-sea cold seep sediments using protein language models.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Bioavailable phosphite in the surface ocean during the Great Oxidation Event.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Active redox cycling of phosphorus on the early Earth.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Contrasting the influences of phosphate and phosphite on growth ofFrontiers in microbiology · 2025Article
- Magmatic and thermally produced reactive phosphorus 3.2 billion years ago and its implications for early life.Communications earth & environment · 2025Article
- Phylogenetic reconciliation: making the most of genomes to understand microbial ecology and evolution.The ISME journal · 2024Review
- Evaluating Serpentinization as a Source of Phosphite to Microbial Communities in Hydrothermal Vents.GeobiologyArticle
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Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Phosphorus plays a crucial role in controlling biological productivity, but geological estimates of phosphate concentrations in the Precambrian ocean, during life's origin and early evolution, vary over several orders of magnitude. While reduced phosphorus species may have served as alternative substrates to phosphate, their bioavailability on the early Earth remains unknown. Here, we reconstruct the phylogenomic record of life on Earth and find that phosphate transporting genes (pnas) evolved in the Paleoarchean (ca. 3.6-3.2 Ga) and are consistent with phosphate concentrations above modern levels ( > 3 µM). The first gene optimized for low phosphate levels (pstS; <1 µM) appeared around the same time or in the Mesoarchean depending on the reconstruction method. Most enzymatic pathways for metabolising reduced phosphorus emerged and expanded across the tree of life later. This includes phosphonate-catabolising CP-lyases, phosphite-oxidising pathways and hypophosphite-oxidising pathways. CP-lyases are particularly abundant in dissolved phosphate concentrations below 0.1 µM. Our results thus indicate at least local regions of declining phosphate levels through the Archean, possibly linked to phosphate-scavenging Fe(III), which may have limited productivity. However, reduced phosphorus species did not become widely used until after the Paleoproterozoic Great Oxidation Event (2.3 Ga), possibly linked to expansion of the biosphere at that time.
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