title: Computational model of abiogenic amino acid condensation to obtain a polar amino acid profile.
abstract: In accordance with the second law of thermodynamics, the Universe as a whole tends to higher entropy. However, the sequence of far-from-equilibrium events that led to the emergence of life on Earth could have imposed order and complexity during the course of chemical reactions in the so-called primordial soup of life. Hence, we may expect to find characteristic profiles or biases in the prebiotic product mixtures, as for instance among the first amino acids. Seeking to shed light on this hypothesis, we have designed a high performance computer program that simulates the spontaneous formation of the amino acid monomers in closed environments. The program was designed in reference to a prebiotic scenario proposed by Sydney W. Fox. The amino acid abundances and their polarities as the two principal biases were also taken into consideration. We regarded the computational model as exhaustive since 200,000 amino acid dimers were formed by simulation, subsequently expressed in a vector and compared with the corresponding amino acid dimers that were experimentally obtained by Fox. We found a very high similarity between the experimental results and our simulations.
authors.affiliation: Facultad de Ciencias de la Salud, Universidad Anáhuac, Col. Lomas Anáhuac C.P. 52786 Huixquilucan Estado de México, México.
authors.forename: Carlos
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Polanco
authors.affiliation: Centro de Investigaciones Químicas, Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Morelos, C.P. 62209 Cuernavaca, Morelos, México.
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Buhse
authors.affiliation: Facultad de Ciencias de la Salud, Universidad Anáhuac, Col. Lomas Anáhuac C.P. 52786 Huixquilucan Estado de México, México.
authors.forename: José Lino
authors.initials: JL
authors.lastname: Samaniego
authors.affiliation: Facultad de Ciencias de la Salud, Universidad Anáhuac, Col. Lomas Anáhuac C.P. 52786 Huixquilucan Estado de México, México.
authors.forename: Jorge Alberto
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Castañón González
authors.affiliation: Departamento de Cómputo Reconfigurable y de Alto Rendimiento, Instituto Nacional de Astrofísica, Óptica y Electrónica, Luis Enrique Erro # 1, C.P: 72840 Tonantzintla, Puebla, México.
authors.forename: Miguel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Arias Estrada
mesh_terms: D000596:Amino Acids / Q000737:chemistry*; D003198:Computer Simulation; D019418:Evolution, Chemical; D005163:Factor Analysis, Statistical; D008956:Models, Chemical; D000069497:Origin of Life; D013816:Thermodynamics
chemical_list: D000596:Amino Acids