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What the Crap?

Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2005 12:27 pm
by AttentionKMartShoppers
Hey, I have someone who barely knows what he's talking about (NO NOT ME) talking about a guy named Fox and protocells-what the heck is that? I've googled it, but not much space is given to protocells...

Re: What the [poop]?

Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2005 2:52 pm
by BGoodForGoodSake
AttentionKMartShoppers wrote:Hey, I have someone who barely knows what he's talking about (NO NOT ME) talking about a guy named Fox and protocells-what the heck is that? I've googled it, but not much space is given to protocells...
Dr. Syndey Fox's work along with Stanley L. Miller and Harold C. Urey experiment form the basis for the origins of life theory.

Fox's experiment shows how protocells, vacuous membranes form spontaneously in certain conditions.
http://www.siu.edu/~protocell/

The Miller/Urey experiment demonstrates how amino acids can form spontaneosly under conditions thought to be abundant when the Earth was young.

Later it was discovered that many of the organic compounds formed in the Miller/Urey experiment are abundant in comets, also the original conditions of early Earth have been reconsidered. Thus the idea that the Earth was "seeded" by interstellar material.

Anyways...
Fox has been credited with discovering life's possible origins, as all life as we know it requires some sort of containing membrane.

There have also been recent experiments with snippets of RNA which can replicate themselves. Could that be the precursor to life? And if so how did they form?

Walter Gilbert, "The RNA World," Nature 319 (1986): 618.

Now the question is how did the self replicating RNA get inside these membranes.

Under every rock there are a million more rocks to look under.

Re: What the [poop]?

Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2005 7:52 pm
by roysr
AttentionKMartShoppers wrote:Hey, I have someone who barely knows what he's talking about (NO NOT ME) talking about a guy named Fox and protocells-what the heck is that? I've googled it, but not much space is given to protocells...
Are you debating with someone outside this forum or something? I am just wondering what the purpose of this post was.