On the Emergence of Autonomous Chemical Systems through Dissipation Kinetics

Autor: Addy Pross, Robert Pascal
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2023
Předmět:
Zdroj: Life, Vol 13, Iss 11, p 2171 (2023)
Druh dokumentu: article
ISSN: 13112171
2075-1729
DOI: 10.3390/life13112171
Popis: This work addresses the kinetic requirements for compensating the entropic cost of self-organization and natural selection, thereby revealing a fundamental principle in biology. Metabolic and evolutionary features of life cannot therefore be separated from an origin of life perspective. Growth, self-organization, evolution and dissipation processes need to be metabolically coupled and fueled by low-entropy energy harvested from the environment. The evolutionary process requires a reproduction cycle involving out-of-equilibrium intermediates and kinetic barriers that prevent the reproductive cycle from proceeding in reverse. Model analysis leads to the unexpectedly simple relationship that the system should be fed energy with a potential exceeding a value related to the ratio of the generation time to the transition state lifetime, thereby enabling a process mimicking natural selection to take place. Reproducing life’s main features, in particular its Darwinian behavior, therefore requires satisfying constraints that relate to time and energy. Irreversible reaction cycles made only of unstable entities reproduce some of these essential features, thereby offering a physical/chemical basis for the possible emergence of autonomy. Such Emerging Autonomous Systems (EASs) are found to be capable of maintaining and reproducing their kind through the transmission of a stable kinetic state, thereby offering a physical/chemical basis for what could be deemed an epigenetic process.
Databáze: Directory of Open Access Journals
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