The Role of Evolution and the Molecules

of Life

Evolution is the theory that all living things

have changed in response to environmental
conditions by the natural selection of randomly
occurring mutations, developing from the simplest
forms to complex forms which are more prolific
and stronger, due to their better adaptation to
their environment.
Charles Darwin provided this insight that
establishes a great chain connecting the distant
past to the present.
At the molecular level, evolution is the history
of the emergence of more complex biomolecules
from simpler organic monomeric units or even
from inorganic counterparts.

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The well known Miller-Urey experiment

showed that simple components can react
abiotically (or in the absence of life) to give
rise to biologically important compounds
such as components of proteins and nucleic
acids.
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picture

Spark-discharge
apparatus type used in
the Miller and Urey
experiment demonstrating
the formation of organic
compounds in abiotic,
primitive atmospheric
conditions. Water is
heated in a closed system
containing NH3, CH4, and
H2. An electric discharge
is passed through the
mixture of gases
simulating lightning. After
several days, organic
molecules including amino
acids were among the
products collected.

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After the spontaneous synthesis of

organic molecules, the next step in evolution
was the formation of macromolecules. Under
prebiotic conditions, macromolecules are
formed spontaneously from monomeric
building blocks as shown below.

Figure from Lehninger,

Albert et. al. 1993.
Principles of Biochemistry
2nd ed. Worth Publishers,
New York.

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From macromolecules come supramolecular

complexes which now become integral parts
and components of living cells.

Figure from Lehninger,

Albert et. al. 1993.
Principles of Biochemistry
2nd ed. Worth Publishers,
New York.

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One of the important molecules of life is

what we know as genes but are actually
chemically, deoxyribonucleic acids (DNA)
that define biological structure and maintain
cellular integrity. These genes encode
proteins that make up cellular structures
and carry out many activities in the cell,
particularly catalytic activity, that increases
rates of cellular reactions producing large
numbers of complex molecules. The
decoding or expression of coded genetic
info in DNA into proteins is made possible by
another molecule the ribonucleic acids
(RNA).
(RNA).

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This trio of macromolecules DNA, RNA

and
proteins is present in all cells. The rest
are
polysaccharides, water, inorganic ions and a
large array of small organic molecules.

Protein
RNA
DNA

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The central dogma of molecular biology

illustrated in the figure below shows the
organizing principle in the flow of genetic
information: DNA to RNA to protein.

Sources of Figures:
Campbell, Mary K. and Shawn O. Farrell. 2006. Biochemistry 5th ed. Thomson
Brooks/Cole, Belmont, CA.
Lehninger, Albert et. al.1993. Principles of Biochemistry 2nd ed. Worth Publishers, New
York.

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Of the macromolecules in present-day

cells, only the nucleic acids are capable of
directing their own self-replication.
Nucleic acids can serve as templates for
their own synthesis as a result of specific
base pairing between complementary
nucleotides.
A critical step in understanding
molecular evolution was thus reached in the
early 1980s, when it was discovered in the
laboratories of Sid Altman and Tom Cech
that RNA is capable of catalyzing a number
of chemical reactions, including the
polymerization of nucleotides. RNA is thus
uniquely able both to serve as a template
for and to catalyze its own replication.

Campbell, Mary K. and Shawn

O. Farrell. 2006. Biochemistry
5th ed. Thomson Brooks/Cole,
Belmont, CA.

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Consequently, RNA is generally believed

to have been the initial genetic system, and
an early stage of chemical evolution is thought
to have been based on self-replicating RNA
molecules a period of evolution known as the
RNA world.
Ordered interactions between RNA and
amino acids then evolved into the present-day
genetic code, and DNA eventually replaced RNA
as the genetic material.
(Source: Cooper, G. M. 2000. The
Cell : A Molecular Approach. 2nd ed.
Sinauer Associates, Inc., Sunderland, MA.)

Link to RNA-world
Hypothesis
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The following figures show the stages in the

evolution of a system of self-replicating RNA
molecules. At each stage, more complexity appears
in the group of RNAs, leading eventually to the
synthesis of proteins as more effective catalysts.

Figures from Campbell, Mary K. and Shawn O. Farrell. 2006.

Biochemistry 5th ed. Thomson Brooks/Cole, Belmont, CA.

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