Jack Szostak: The Origin of Life: Not as Hard as it Looks?

Lecture by Dr Jack Szostak, 2009 Nobel laureate in Physiology or Medicine and member of the Molecular Frontiers Scientific Advisory Board, at the Molecular Frontiers Symposium "On Human Origins and the Future of Humanity", at Lund University April 18-19, 2024. The symposium was co-organized with Lund University and the Royal Physiographic Society of Lund.
ABSTRACT:
The combined efforts of laboratories around the world have begun to converge on a reasonable pathway going all the way from planet formation to the beginnings of life itself. Many deeply embedded preconceptions have had to be overcome and discarded in order to enable progress. I will explain how overcoming these conceptual barriers has enabled fresh thinking into how the molecules of life were synthesized on the early Earth and then assembled into the first living cells. Once the ability of life to evolve in a Darwinian sense had become firmly established, life was free to adapt, diversify, and flourish, eventually giving rise to all the varieties of life we see around us today.

[@juanpineda291]

Life just requires a system for molecular assembly guided by precise instructions. Easy.

[@mcmanustony]

Who provided the instructions prior to there being life? You’ve not thought this through

[@derekbredensteiner3957]

@@mcmanustonyInteresting, I had read Juan’s comment as sarcastic (the word easy specifically, I thought Juan meant it was not so much, which interestingly enough is pretty much what Jack says in the video, despite the title).

[@williamwhitten7820]

*Easy?!?!?!?!? Hahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!*

[@derekbredensteiner3957]

@@williamwhitten7820 Are you okay?

[@williamwhitten7820]

@@derekbredensteiner3957 *Yes of course.* *I was just responding to Juan Pineda's comment at the head of this thread.*

[@richardg.lanzara3732]

The most amazing thing about life is that all life uses the same basic biochemistries with the same amino acids!

[@woman4womenkids547]

Only those with left handed chirality. If amino acids spontaneous assemble, they assemble both left and right handed. They don’t self assemble into complex proteins: they break down over time.

[@caesarskiba9008]

Good luck "evolving" even with all the starter materials. Time is the enemy of evolution

[@DimensionPicturesAOT]

@@caesarskiba9008 Expand on what you mean by that please

[@martinjan2334]

yes, it is elegant ... that's another proof of a mastermind engineering ...

[@martinjan2334]

Not as hard as it looks? So far no Nobel prize for origin-of-life research. Not once in 70 years. Not as hard as it looks? Jack Szostak (World Science Festival, 2014): I will create "life in lab" in 3 to 5 years, more likely in 3 years. That was 10 years ago ... Not as hard as it looks ? Jack Szostak (University of Chicago interview, 2021): "I am still working on a self-replicating molecule" Not as hard as it looks? Szostak doesn't even have his self-replicating molecule, let alone life ...

[@neuromancer845]

As long as OoL researchers can sell you on their wild ideas and compelling theories to generate more funding and interest in their work, this academic shell game will continue. Even Lee Cronin admitted in a candid tweet that "Origin of life research is a scam".

[@kemicalhazard8770]

You've been watching too much James Tour

[@mcmanustony]

"Jack Szostak (World Science Festival, 2014): I will create "life in lab" in 3 to 5 years, more likely in 3 years"- can you give a citation for this quote?

[@martinjan2334]

​@@mcmanustony it is easy to google it ... I am afraid, that a direct link will be banned by youtube. To be honest, I am surprised that my initial comment on this subject went through. But it is very easy to google it ... Put into google the following words: Jack Szostak Susan Mazur interview at Scoop Let me know ... By the way, did you know, that Jack Szostak had to retract his RNA World paper, published 2016 in NATURE, because his origin-of-life experiment couldn't be reproduced by his own colleagues ? Again, it is easy to google it, search for: Jack Szostak Retraction watch Happy reading ...

[@martinjan2334]

​@@kemicalhazard8770 Forget about Tour ... think about what I wrote in my initial post ... Why no Nobel prize ? I can understand your frustration, but this is a very simple question ... Where are all these "countless breakthroughs" in origin-of-life research I hear about all the time ? Why no Nobel prize so far ?

[@mattijunnila2354]

Life is information. Szostak's ideas are far from it.

[@baraskparas9559]

The work of coscientious, high achieving scientists like Szostak and Deamer comprise just a few lines in a thorough narrative of life's origin and evolution due to the enormity of the events and chemistry. A new book published by Austin Macauley Publishers titled From Chemistry to Life on Earth outlines abiogenesis in great detail with a solution to the evolution of the genetic code and the ribosome as well as the cell in general using 290 references, 50 illustrations and several information tables with a proposed molecular natural selection formula with a worked example for ATP. Available cheap on kindle and other ebooks.

[@danchokonstantinov6735]

Barask Paraskevopoulos was born in Athens, Greece, and migrated with his parents from one year of age to Melbourne, Australia. Six years of studying medicine at Monash University, a science degree in cell biology and pharmacology at Monash as well as a Bachelor of Arts degree in English Literature and Criminology at Melbourne University together with a lifelong interest in biology and biochemistry put him in good stead to tackle the difficult scenario of life’s origin. Modern Greek Tragedy-Comedy written by pseudo-science pseudo-journalist !

[@baraskparas9559]

@@danchokonstantinov6735 Thanks Stanko! Tell me where you are from and I will return to you an ethnic slur so you can see what it feels like. I know a lot more about science than you and I was not lucky enough to be a journalist.

[@danchokonstantinov6735]

​​​​​@@baraskparas9559 I am bulgarian with roots from southern Makedonia, which greeks ethnically cleansed with western support . I also studied medicine and practise medicine under the Hypocrates oath . I have interest in genetics & biochemistry . PS : MD - Varna, FCS - RSA, FCS - BG, FRCS - EIRE . Enjoy - kzbin.info/www/bejne/eWnHlX5nmLh0i8Usi=w7krinqkPY_H_EJG kzbin.info/www/bejne/hKK0c5afprSsbZYsi=xw_8AAh1mIx8eYRa kzbin.info/www/bejne/rXi4eYaKeLeUbtksi=mGpJw9idaKTc0qF_

[@theuntouchable7277]

Yes, let's check James Tour's critique of OoL claims.

[@WayneLynch69]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/rnqrfqF6Z6t3m7s Richard Dawkins sits mute/deaf/sub-moronic as actual Nobel laureates in biology & Craig Venter ALL say "It is impossible that humans will EVER know life's origin'' TALK'S CHEAP MFR...UNLESS YOU'RE PAYING DAWKINS' SPEAKING FEES

[@mcmanustony]

Tour is a disgraced lying fanatic. He doesn’t work in OoL.

[@mcmanustony]

@@WayneLynch69why do you post such pathetic lies? Dawkins IS NOT MUTE. Why do you people lie so much?

[@WayneLynch69]

@@mcmanustony You IMAGINE Dawkins confutes those three stating that it's "impossible humans will EVER know life's origin"? You're more ignorant than I thought...and that doesn't seem possible.

[@mcmanustony]

@@WayneLynch69 what the fuck are you talking about?

[@michaelcollins8527]

Dr JS said hydrothermal vents supplied hot water to the murky ponds filled with protocells and nucleotides, etc. Actually hydrothermal vents are the source of those ponds. the hot water and everything needed to make life

[@ActedUponNoMore]

Lost credibility when he said he could make a simple cell in the laboratory. Prove that claim. Nobody has created a cell in the lab in a prebiotic way.

[@mcmanustony]

When did he make that claim?

[@mcmanustony]

@@ActedUponNoMore ….and??

[@danchokonstantinov6735]

​@@mcmanustony J Craig Venter allegedly created bacterium synthetically, he simply replaced the nucleus of a bacterium with recombinant DNA with allegedly minimum genes for reproduction & Life. I guess his 'synthetic' bacterium degraded in the wild as purposeless and useless in the grand design of life ! That is the legacy of mickey mouse theories-forgotten at best ! That is what happens when DNA is tweaked - ORGANISM STERILITY. JCVenter is prime example of human greed and egocentrism, but the guy made a fortune. That is where his mind and heart dwells .

[@allencottell4241]

The Creative Source & Center is well beyond our current science and theology. A closed mind is the enemy.

[@Diamonddavej]

A simple cell can be easily made in the laboratory, it's called a chemical garden. This is a chemical phenomenon involving a inorganic metal salt and a solution of silica, the reaction between the two precipitates a flexible semi-permiable membrane that mimics properties of simple cells. It has a redox gradient, it also produces a osmotic pressure that causes growth. Several researchers propose the first cells were inorganic, either made of iron sulfide or lipids (soap like polar molecules). Also, it's important to remember that before life emerged, there wasn't anything to eat organic molecules, so a soup of organic molecules could have formed, that would be not have accumulated if there was, life around to eat it.

[@anandasonar3909]

Life is present everywhere but not in form as we expect 😊

[@teds2794]

Wait a minute. No one has even come close to making a proto-cell in any lab! No one has even come close to making the four essential classes of chemicals that are necessary - amino acids, nucleic acids, carbs and lipids - under prebiotic conditions. Have you seen the structure of a simple cell? The membrane alone is exceedingly complex! As James Tour points out, in chemistry time is the enemy!! Why doesn't Jack Sosznac respond to Jim Tour?

[@mcmanustony]

You'd have a bit more credibility if you could get the name right. SZOSTAK. "No one has even come close to making the four essential classes of chemicals that are necessary - amino acids, nucleic acids, carbs and lipids - under prebiotic conditions"- really? Miller Urey was SEVENTY YEARS AGO. Maybe OoL researchers are too busy working to pay much attention to a screaming, lying zealot such as Tour. He doesn't work in this field, never has, never will and only peddles abuse for religious reasons.

[@danchokonstantinov6735]

​@@mcmanustony kV electric shock delivery created aminoacids ? And then second electric shock destroyed the self-assembly ?

[@mcmanustony]

@@danchokonstantinov6735 Wrong. The Miller- Urey apparatus was found later to have synthesized over a dozen amino acids.

[@danchokonstantinov6735]

​@@mcmanustony tens of years later = fraud .

[@mcmanustony]

@@danchokonstantinov6735they found amino acids at the time. The found several more later. Fraud? You are lying smear monger. What the fuck is wrong with you people?

[@danchokonstantinov6735]

Modern life is incredibly complicated and incredibly self referential ? But we have deeply engaved prejudices ? But we have seen life arose here ! Not so hard from chemistry to biology , easy path though !? There are many places with water to support life / but we do not know . Life is part of metabolic chart , informationally is very complicated, crazy theories, central dogma, but RNA held the answer , RNA as enzyme / where is the allosteric domain ? , chemistry of early climate made complicated structure , structures are very easy to assemble in lab chemistry and physics give rise to self replication ? JACK, CHECK FOR THOSE BETA SHEETS IN THE GREY MATTER . YOUR BUDDY JC VENTER OFFER DIAGNOSTIC TESTS, BUT THE GUY IS GREEDY AND CHARGES FORTUNE.

[@peterz53]

Why is life elsewhere consigned to zero probability or "we don't know?" Why doesn't one example, and an example tied to physical processes which exist elsewhere, count for something even if we can't properly apply statistics.

[@TonyTigerTonyTiger]

Where is zero probability stated?

[@derekbredensteiner3957]

“My view is we don’t know” seems like a sensible thing to say when there is low probability, to me, which is what Jack said. Jack did not say zero probability. Are “don’t know” and “zero probability” equivalent to you? If so, why?

[@TempleElaine-z4l]

Hernandez Jose Walker Nancy Harris Jason

[@aunch3]

Not as hard as it looks then create it bro

[@mcmanustony]

@@aunch3 the task is to understand not mimic

[@aunch3]

What? Bro just be humble and accept that you don’t have all the answers. Just take the L, learn from it, and move on

[@mcmanustony]

@@aunch3 what the fuck is wrong with you? No one Szostak included claims the question is settled. There is a difference between not having all the answers and having none of the answers. Spare me the sermon…

[@mcmanustony]

@@aunch3 what the hell is wrong with you? NO ONE claims to have all the answers. Not Jack Szostak, not Nick Lane, not Addy Pross....not any of the researchers in OoL. It's an open problem in empirical science. Spare me the sermon...you are utterly clueless.

[@mcmanustony]

@@aunch3 Spare me the pompous sermons. Since you like to dish out “advice” try this. Shut up and learn some science

[@michaelleslie9055]

That's how they make their money

[@mcmanustony]

Who? How? Doing what?

[@mcmanustony]

Any update on your grunt?

[@mcmanustony]

And???

[@williamwhitten7820]

*Dr Jack Szostak should admit that science hasn't a clue of how life began.*

[@danielpaulson8838]

That would be dishonest. Science seeks and knocks. Get on board.

[@michaelcollins8527]

pretty sure he said that. he's discussing experiments based on a hypothesis. wwjd

[@williamwhitten7820]

@@michaelcollins8527 *Yea...The "primordial soup" theory was proposed by Alexander Oparin and John Scott Haldane who independently developed the idea around the 1920s, with Oparin first publishing his concept in 1924 and Haldane in 1929.* *It is 2024 and it is still a hypothesis.* *A hundred years and still no go.*

[@danielpaulson8838]

@@williamwhitten7820 Religion still makes claims of magic. They only use the Bible to justify hatred. Isn’t that right?

[@mcmanustony]

@@williamwhitten7820 life took 700,000,000 years to emerge on earth. 100 years and it’s not completely understood……therefore Jesus! Good grief…

[@deepcosmiclove]

Alternative theory: In the Beginng God Created the Heavens and the Earth.

[@YNVNEone]

Not even close.

[@mcmanustony]

That’s a religious fantasy, not a theory. It explains nothing, is not testable….. Try again.

[@deepcosmiclove]

@@mcmanustony It explains everything.

[@mcmanustony]

@@deepcosmiclove wrong.

[@reign2566]

Nope

[@mykrahmaan3408]

The problem with our search for knowledge per se, not just the origin of life, is the inbuilt lack of purpose in the IDEAL of science, viz. KNOWLEDGE FOR ITS OWN SAKE OUT OF CURIOSITY, along with its even more misguided criterion of proof: PREDICTIONS tallying with results of experiments and/or observations, as both these lack any direct relevance to the sustenance of life (as commonly understood) on this earth. On the contrary, the sole purpose cum criterion of proof of all knowledge SHOULD be set as: PRACTICAL PREVENTION OF ALL EVIL (defined exhaustively as DISASTERS, PREDATION, DISEASES ~ which include all birth defects, all weapons manufacture, all violence ~ and DEATH). That way, the traditional basing of mathematics and physics on describing PREDICTABLY the celestial motions, without any relevance to life function, can be discarded to set deriving, instead, "the mathematical model of the mechanism how particle interactions inside the earth develop PLANTS on its own surface, to then deliver and sustain living beings here through them" as the sole purpose cum criterion of all knowledge. Thus integrating arithmetic, geometry and particle physics by interpreting DIGITS, with which we perform calculations in our minds (NOT the electrons in the chips we manufacture ourselves), as unique type of particles with the 4 basic arithmetic operations as the only LAWS OF MOTION for all interactions among them, in our minds AND INSIDE THE CORE OF THE EARTH. This correspondence of the LAWS OF MOTION of DIGIT interactions in our minds and inside the Core of The Earth substitutes the necessity for Bohr's anthropocentric correspondence requirement as well as the necessity for the application of the two types of mutually incompatible LAWS OF MOTION in physics (Newtonian ones for particles in classical physics and Schrödingers wave function in QM) for calculations of interactions inside the earth that develop PLANTS on its own surface. As the accuracy of The Model so derived, and all related assumptions as to existence of particle types in formulating it, must be verifiable by any lay person by their applicability for practical influencing of the development of, and growth on, PLANTS neither special experiments nor any special observations would be necessary to prove the accuracy of The Model. Remember, this earth is the only vessel in the entire known universe, that manufactures bodies of living beings in its bowels to then deliver and sustain them on its own surface through the PLANTS it develops here for that purpose. Hence it MUST be seen and analyzed as such. And NOT as a mediocre ball of nonliving matter stupidly revolving around an insignificant star for no purpose whatsoever as suggested by Copernicus and accepted as absolute truth, practically by ALL (minus one) ON THIS EARTH, at present.

[@mcmanustony]

@@mykrahmaan3408 put the pipe down. Step away from the pipe …

[@mykrahmaan3408]

@@mcmanustony Clever people learn from other people's mistakes. Ordinary people learn from own mistakes. FOOLS NEVER LEARN!

[@mcmanustony]

@@mykrahmaan3408 did that sound good in your head?

[@marcinna8553]

Yawn

[@peter-b7s]

bunch of guessing garbage

[@danielpaulson8838]

You should see The Bible if you want some fantasy.

[@michaelcollins8527]

science is the throwing away of garbage guesses

[@peter-b7s]

@@danielpaulson8838 keep reading your copy of the "little red book"

[@danielpaulson8838]

@@peter-b7s I’d rather read the Bible. That’s how I know it’s full of really poor values.

[@mcmanustony]

@@peter-b7s you seem to have lost your mind. Where were you when you last had it

[@thechiralkid6349]

I don't see how different kinds of nucleotides can just "accumulate" (24:00) in some warm little pond on the primordial earth. Could we make that happen now, even if we tried? No! And if that can't happen, then the whole thing is just wishful thinking, and almost certainly completely impossible.

[@Diamonddavej]

They belive organic molecules accumulated on sticky mineral surfaces or within proto-cells, which were either inorganic (iron sulfide) or organic (lipid bubbles) semi-permiable cell like compartments (tiny bubbles). It's important to understand, these proto-cellular compartments formed inorganically, without the need for life, and they concentrated biomolecules inside. Inorganic proto-cells form today e.g. Moss Agate. Another good example of a proto-cell is the chemical garden, which mimics some rudimentary properties of living cells.

[@Video2Webb]

There is something called 'irrevocability' in this universe. Events may not be replicated in any setting subsequent to the original setting. It's about unique properties which can never be replicated again. That's my view. The job of scientists studying the origin of life is not only to imagine how that happened in the geological realities some 4 billion years ago, but also to explain how this process may never be replicated in a lab today, or in a place like Yellowstone, etc. All we can get is clues through our machines available today. The emergence of life is irrevocable. Unique.

[@thechiralkid6349]

@@Video2Webb Cool. If the emergence of life is irrevocable, that must mean that life will never end. That’s nice to know, but it doesn’t have much to do with how life got started in the first place. These scientists whose job includes imagining how life could have started 4 billion years ago can do a lot of imagining if they just want to wave their hands around and imagine impossible things. That’s easy to do. And the other part of their job - explaining why the origin of life can’t be replicated today - that’s easy too. It can’t be replicated today because it never could have been done anywhere, any time, any place without some super-intelligence to put it all together. Have these scientists discovered anything about “unique properties which can never be replicated again” which allowed life to form 4 billion years ago, even though it couldn’t happen now? I don’t think so. That’s my view anyway. No one knows the answer but I go along with Sherlock Holmes when he says, “When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” (But it really helps to know your organic chemistry if you want to understand that abiogenesis really is and always was totally impossible.)

[@danchokonstantinov6735]

​@@Diamonddavej so where did it happen, thermal vents, rocks, meteorites, lab tube or vivid imaginations and cravings of narcissists.

[@lepidoptera9337]

@@thechiralkid6349 The Earth's atmosphere was very different back then. Can the same chemical reactions happen in an oxygen atmosphere? No. But why are you telling us that you don't understand chemistry? We don't care about all the things that you don't understand. ;-)

[@tedshew6393]

My my, Jack - you certainly have not been keeping up! Since Miller-Urey, at least...

[@mcmanustony]

I think he understands Miller Urey better than you.

[@danchokonstantinov6735]

​@@mcmanustony Elimentary school experiment ? By the way, Miller was supposed to do PhD with Ed Teller / H2 bomb father /, but Miller was found to be underperformer in quantum physics and was a drop out.