David Deamer | University of California, Santa Cruz (original) (raw)
Papers by David Deamer
Co-Published with Macmillan Publishers Ltd, UK eBooks, Aug 1, 2009
Genetics professor Michelle Murphy loses her husband under mysterious circumstances and without w... more Genetics professor Michelle Murphy loses her husband under mysterious circumstances and without warning, while their brilliant eight-year-old daughter Avalon, adopted in Kazakhstan, stubbornly believes she is a mutant. As if this were not enough, she soon finds herself thrown into the middle of a quickly thickening plot, where the legacy of Genghis Khan meets the hunt for FOXP5, a genetic transcription factor that could herald the dawn of new human species. Initially caught helplessly between well-meaning fellow scientists, the government, and more sinister agents, Michelle eventually takes control with the help of a host of unlikely heroes and finds the courage to confront the decision of whether to save human lives or humanity. The scientific and technical aspects underlying the plot in particular aspects of FOX proteins, genetic mutations, viruses, and cancer as well as the relation between intelligence and cortical complexity are introduced and discussed by the authors in an ext...
Astrobiology, 2019
Two processes required for life's origin are condensation reactions that produce essential bi... more Two processes required for life's origin are condensation reactions that produce essential biopolymers by a nonenzymatic reaction, and self-assembly of membranous compartments that encapsulate the polymers into populations of protocells. Because life today thrives not just in the temperate ocean and lakes but also in extreme conditions of temperature, salinity, and pH, there is a general assumption that any form of liquid water would be sufficient to support the origin of life as long as there are sources of chemical energy and simple organic compounds. We argue here that the first forms of life would be physically and chemically fragile and would be strongly affected by ionic solutes and pH. A hypothesis emerges from this statement that hot springs associated with volcanic land masses have an ionic composition more conducive to self-assembly and polymerization than seawater. Here we have compared the ionic solutes of seawater with those of terrestrial hot springs. We then describe preliminary experimental results that show how the hypothesis can be tested in a prebiotic analog environment.
Scientific American, 2017
Science and Fiction, 2016
IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Magazine, 1999
Astrobiology, 2019
We present a testable hypothesis related to an origin of life on land in which fluctuating volcan... more We present a testable hypothesis related to an origin of life on land in which fluctuating volcanic hot spring pools play a central role. The hypothesis is based on experimental evidence that lipid-encapsulated polymers can be synthesized by cycles of hydration and dehydration to form protocells. Drawing on metaphors from the bootstrapping of a simple computer operating system, we show how protocells cycling through wet, dry, and moist phases will subject polymers to combinatorial selection and draw structural and catalytic functions out of initially random sequences, including structural stabilization, pore formation, and primitive metabolic activity. We propose that protocells aggregating into a hydrogel in the intermediate moist phase of wet-dry cycles represent a primitive progenote system. Progenote populations can undergo selection and distribution, construct niches in new environments, and enable a sharing network effect that can collectively evolve them into the first microbial communities. Laboratory and field experiments testing the first steps of the scenario are summarized. The scenario is then placed in a geological setting on the early Earth to suggest a plausible pathway from life's origin in chemically optimal freshwater hot spring pools to the emergence of microbial communities tolerant to more extreme conditions in dilute lakes and salty conditions in marine environments. A continuity is observed for biogenesis beginning with simple protocell aggregates, through the transitional form of the progenote, to robust microbial mats that leave the fossil imprints of stromatolites so representative in the rock record. A roadmap to future testing of the hypothesis is presented. We compare the oceanic vent with land-based pool scenarios for an origin of life and explore their implications for subsequent evolution to multicellular life such as plants. We conclude by utilizing the hypothesis to posit where life might also have emerged in habitats such as Mars or Saturn's icy moon Enceladus.
Viva origino, Aug 10, 2005
WORLD SCIENTIFIC eBooks, Apr 1, 2019
Carolina Digital Repository (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill), 2008
WORLD SCIENTIFIC eBooks, Apr 8, 2019
XVIIIth International Conference on the Origin of Life, Jul 1, 2017
waters, H. Schmidt, W. Vercoutere, D. Deamer, A.R. Hawkins, R. C. Quinn, A. S. Burton, and C. P. ... more waters, H. Schmidt, W. Vercoutere, D. Deamer, A.R. Hawkins, R. C. Quinn, A. S. Burton, and C. P. McKay, NASA Postdoctoral Program (Kathryn.f.bywaters@nasa.gov), University of California, Santa Cruz (hschmidt@soe.ucsc.edu; deamer@soe.ucsc.edu), NASA Ames Research Center (wenonah.a.vercoutere@nasa.gov; chris.mckay@nasa.gov; richard.c.quinn@nasa.gov), Brigham Young University (Hawkins@ee.byu.edu), NASA Johnson Space Center (aaron.burton@nasa.gov)
Co-Published with Macmillan Publishers Ltd, UK eBooks, Aug 1, 2009
Genetics professor Michelle Murphy loses her husband under mysterious circumstances and without w... more Genetics professor Michelle Murphy loses her husband under mysterious circumstances and without warning, while their brilliant eight-year-old daughter Avalon, adopted in Kazakhstan, stubbornly believes she is a mutant. As if this were not enough, she soon finds herself thrown into the middle of a quickly thickening plot, where the legacy of Genghis Khan meets the hunt for FOXP5, a genetic transcription factor that could herald the dawn of new human species. Initially caught helplessly between well-meaning fellow scientists, the government, and more sinister agents, Michelle eventually takes control with the help of a host of unlikely heroes and finds the courage to confront the decision of whether to save human lives or humanity. The scientific and technical aspects underlying the plot in particular aspects of FOX proteins, genetic mutations, viruses, and cancer as well as the relation between intelligence and cortical complexity are introduced and discussed by the authors in an ext...
Astrobiology, 2019
Two processes required for life's origin are condensation reactions that produce essential bi... more Two processes required for life's origin are condensation reactions that produce essential biopolymers by a nonenzymatic reaction, and self-assembly of membranous compartments that encapsulate the polymers into populations of protocells. Because life today thrives not just in the temperate ocean and lakes but also in extreme conditions of temperature, salinity, and pH, there is a general assumption that any form of liquid water would be sufficient to support the origin of life as long as there are sources of chemical energy and simple organic compounds. We argue here that the first forms of life would be physically and chemically fragile and would be strongly affected by ionic solutes and pH. A hypothesis emerges from this statement that hot springs associated with volcanic land masses have an ionic composition more conducive to self-assembly and polymerization than seawater. Here we have compared the ionic solutes of seawater with those of terrestrial hot springs. We then describe preliminary experimental results that show how the hypothesis can be tested in a prebiotic analog environment.
Scientific American, 2017
Science and Fiction, 2016
IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Magazine, 1999
Astrobiology, 2019
We present a testable hypothesis related to an origin of life on land in which fluctuating volcan... more We present a testable hypothesis related to an origin of life on land in which fluctuating volcanic hot spring pools play a central role. The hypothesis is based on experimental evidence that lipid-encapsulated polymers can be synthesized by cycles of hydration and dehydration to form protocells. Drawing on metaphors from the bootstrapping of a simple computer operating system, we show how protocells cycling through wet, dry, and moist phases will subject polymers to combinatorial selection and draw structural and catalytic functions out of initially random sequences, including structural stabilization, pore formation, and primitive metabolic activity. We propose that protocells aggregating into a hydrogel in the intermediate moist phase of wet-dry cycles represent a primitive progenote system. Progenote populations can undergo selection and distribution, construct niches in new environments, and enable a sharing network effect that can collectively evolve them into the first microbial communities. Laboratory and field experiments testing the first steps of the scenario are summarized. The scenario is then placed in a geological setting on the early Earth to suggest a plausible pathway from life's origin in chemically optimal freshwater hot spring pools to the emergence of microbial communities tolerant to more extreme conditions in dilute lakes and salty conditions in marine environments. A continuity is observed for biogenesis beginning with simple protocell aggregates, through the transitional form of the progenote, to robust microbial mats that leave the fossil imprints of stromatolites so representative in the rock record. A roadmap to future testing of the hypothesis is presented. We compare the oceanic vent with land-based pool scenarios for an origin of life and explore their implications for subsequent evolution to multicellular life such as plants. We conclude by utilizing the hypothesis to posit where life might also have emerged in habitats such as Mars or Saturn's icy moon Enceladus.
Viva origino, Aug 10, 2005
WORLD SCIENTIFIC eBooks, Apr 1, 2019
Carolina Digital Repository (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill), 2008
WORLD SCIENTIFIC eBooks, Apr 8, 2019
XVIIIth International Conference on the Origin of Life, Jul 1, 2017
waters, H. Schmidt, W. Vercoutere, D. Deamer, A.R. Hawkins, R. C. Quinn, A. S. Burton, and C. P. ... more waters, H. Schmidt, W. Vercoutere, D. Deamer, A.R. Hawkins, R. C. Quinn, A. S. Burton, and C. P. McKay, NASA Postdoctoral Program (Kathryn.f.bywaters@nasa.gov), University of California, Santa Cruz (hschmidt@soe.ucsc.edu; deamer@soe.ucsc.edu), NASA Ames Research Center (wenonah.a.vercoutere@nasa.gov; chris.mckay@nasa.gov; richard.c.quinn@nasa.gov), Brigham Young University (Hawkins@ee.byu.edu), NASA Johnson Space Center (aaron.burton@nasa.gov)