Research Projects

The study aims to explore the origins of proteins, which became crucial cellular machinery on early Earth. The emergence of living systems from a non-living prebiotic soup remains a mystery. Modern protein synthesis relies on a complex ribosome, and it is unlikely that anything similar existed on Earth 3-4 billion years ago. The building blocks of life, such as amino acids and nucleobase, were likely present on prebiotic Earth. Self-assembled nano-fibers of peptide/amino acid-nucleobase conjugate molecules will be tested as a template for prebiotic protein synthesis. The selected peptides/proteins will be studied inside vesicles to investigate prebiotic catalysis and its impact on protocellular survivability.