Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Wang, Wenxin
• Qiao, Lina
• He, Jing
• Ju, Yun
• Yu, Kai
• Kan, Guangfeng
• Guo, Changlu
• Zhang, Hong
• Jiang, Jie

Titel

Water Microdroplets Allow Spontaneously Abiotic Production of Peptides

Ist Teil von

• The journal of physical chemistry letters, 2021-06, Vol.12 (24), p.5774-5780

Ort / Verlag

American Chemical Society

Erscheinungsjahr

2021

Quelle

Alma/SFX Local Collection

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• The chemistry of abiotic synthesis of peptides in the context of their prebiotic origins is a continuing challenge that arises from thermodynamic and kinetic constraints in aqueous media. Here we reported a strategy of microdroplets’ mass spectrometry for peptide bonds formed from pure amino acids or a mixture in the presence of phosphoric acids in aqueous microdroplets. In contrast to bulk experiments, the condensation reactions proceed spontaneously under ambient conditions. The microdroplet gave a negative free-energy change (ΔG ∼ −1.1 kcal/mol), and product yields of ∼75% were obtained at the scale of a few milliseconds. Experiments in which nebulization gas pressure and external charge were varied established dependence of peptide production on the droplet size that has a high surface-to-volume ratio. It is concluded that the condensation reactions occurred at or near the air–water interfaces of microdroplets. This aqueous microdroplets approach also provides a route for chemistry synthesis in the prebiotic era.