Phosphorus is a key biologic element, and a prebiotic pathway leading to its incorporation into biomolecules has been difficult to ascertain. Most potentially prebiotic phosphorylation reactions have relied on orthophosphate as the source of phosphorus. It is suggested here that the geochemistry of phosphorus on the early Earth was instead controlled by reduced oxidation state phosphorus compou...

The RNA World hypothesis presupposes that abiotic reactions originally produced nucleotides, the monomers of RNA and universal constituents of metabolism. However, compatible prebiotic reactions for the synthesis of complementary (that is, base pairing) nucleotides and mechanisms for their mutual selection within a complex chemical environment have not been reported. Here we show that two plaus...

This work attempts to rationalize the possible prebiotic profile of the first dipeptides of about 4 billion years ago based on a computational discrete dynamic system that uses the final yields of the dipeptides obtained in Rode's experiments of salt-induced peptide formation (Rode et al., 1999, Peptides 20: 773-786). The system built a prebiotic scenario that allowed us to observe that (i) the...

This article discusses the hypothesized composition and organization of cytoplasm in prebiotic cells from a theoretical perspective and also based upon what is currently known about bacterial cytoplasm. It is unknown if the first prebiotic, microscopic scale, cytoplasm was initially contained within a primitive, continuous, semipermeable membrane, or was an uncontained gel substance, that later...

this study was conducted because of influence of prebiotics (alphamune) and symbiotic (biomin) on histometrical development of small intestine and lymphatic tissue of caecal tonsil have been not reported on broiler chicken. in this study, different parts of small intestine and caecal tonsil, which is a major area of gut associated lymphatic tissue (galt) in chicken were selected. one hundred an...

background oral administration of pro- and prebiotics has recently been considered as an effective way for nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (nafld) recovery. objectives the current study aimed at evaluating the effect of supplementation with probiotics and/or prebiotics on liver function tests in patients with nafld. methods in this double blind, placebo-control clinical trial, 75 subjects with...

The human intestine hosts a complex bacterial community that plays a major role in nutrition and in maintaining human health. A functional metagenomic approach was used to explore the prebiotic breakdown potential of human gut bacteria, including non-cultivated ones. Two metagenomic libraries, constructed from ileum mucosa and fecal microbiota, were screened for hydrolytic activities on the pre...

As of today, the most credible scientific paradigm pertaining to the origin of life on Earth is undoubtedly the RNA World scenario. It is built on the assumption that catalytically active replicators (most probably RNA-like macromolecules) may have been responsible for booting up life almost four billion years ago. The many different incarnations of nucleotide sequence (string) replicator model...

Prebiotic oligosaccharides have the ability to generate important changes in the gut microbiota composition that may confer health benefits to the host. Reducing the impurities in prebiotic mixtures could expand their applications in food industries and improve their selectivity and prebiotic effect on the potential beneficial bacteria such as bifidobacteria and lactobacilli. This study aimed t...