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Amino Acids Created in Deep-Space-Like Environment
klevin writes "NASA scientists today announced the creation of amino acids, critical for life, in an environment that mimics deep space. The above link is the press release, with additional details here."
This is mildly cool, but honestly it's done all the time by companies like TwinLab who sell them to body builders in little glass jars.
Why bother growing them in space when you can bring them with you? Sounds like NASA is taking the long way around.
I can create them there.
I can create them anywhere!
I will not evolve them in a house
I will not evolve them with a mouse
I do not like space genes of man
I do not like them Sam I am.
Prefix: I am not a Creationist.
"I think this is proof against one of the arguments creationist wackos have been making for quite a long time"
Actually this does nothing of the sort.
What this shows is that the basic components of life--Amino Acids--/can/ be generated in a deep space environment. Whoop de do. The argument against abiogenisis (chemical evolution) stems from the following:
1) Probability versus chance of creating functional proteins. We don't know what this is, but we do know that it is incredibly small. The probability is so small, in fact, that no number of trials that could have occurred within the lifespan of the universe would be sufficient.
2) The number of mutations it takes to create a functional allele (what gives us different characteristics) is a *massive* number. The number of mutations it takes to make a functional allele "nonfunctional" is *one*.
3) It takes millions of mutations to create a hox gene. The number it takes to take one out is *trivial* by comparison.
This does not make the creationist argument correct, but it doesn't mean that this evidence of where Amino Acids can or cannot form lends credence to abiogenesis to the degree or diversity of life that we see.
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There is a great deal of doubt whether the mixture of gases used in this experiment actually existed on earth: it assumes a reducing atmosphere, among other things that geology does not tell us.
More than one geologist, in fact, has noted that the only reason that they believe that there ever was a reducing atmosphere on Earth is because life is obviously here and the basic building blocks couldn't form in the presence of Oxygen.
At the same time, however, those amino acids couldn't form without the presence of an ozone layer--which requires free oxygen.
This is interesting and intriguing because it shows how these blocks could form in deep space and then arrive on Earth--since we already know that they can remain intact in their descent through the atmosphere.
It still doesn't even come *close* to answer the criticisms levied against abiogenesis (the formation of proteins, functional alleles, &c), but it is interesting and extremely significant over the Urey-Miller experiment.
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Nope. The point is gone. Proteins are just lots of amino acids, connected by single bonds. The hard part is getting all those constituent atoms to form into the relatively complex amino acids.
As a protein/organic chemist, I say to you: why don't you try making that single bond? It's quite hard when you don't have a ribosome to do all the work for you.
Stanley Miller has been making amino acids (granted, the wrong way) since 1955. And he didn't even have his doctorate yet. Raw amino acids are easy- what's difficult is selecting the proper stereochemistry (amino acids have mirror images which are chemically identical but structurally different- life only uses one of the two mirror images (enantiomers)). If you condense the wrong enantiomer, or both enantiomers simultaneously, you get garbage out. Same problem with nucleic acids to DNA. In the end, this report is plagued with the same problems that Stanley Miller faced in 1955, sorry kids, deep space (or almost every other non-biological natural chemical synthesis) doesn't care about symmetry.
If you're interested in a brief history of Miller, why he's wrong, and what we think now, see my other post.