BIOL 211 Lecture Notes - Lecture 16: Sulfur Dioxide, Continental Drift, Allopatric Speciation
Document Summary
In the center is a droplet of water, which could contain information-containing polymers: formation of self-replicating, information-containing, catalytic molecules (rna, cells need information-containing molecules (dna) and catalytic molecules (protein). Rna can do both: rna contains information that serves as a template for making identical strands, and can serve as a catalyst by folding on itself and acquiring tertiary structure, ribozymes catalytic rna molecules. Early life may have been rna based with a later transition to dna to contain information (dna is more stable than rna) Increased oxygen allowed aerobic metabolism to evolve, used by many prokaryotes and almost all eukaryotes: oxygen levels on earth have been controlled by living organisms and strongly affected evolution of living organisms. Increased oxygen extinction of prokaryote lineages, permitted evolution of aerobic organisms: changes in climate, volcanoes, meteorites mass extinctions, speciation and extinction together determine how much diversity is present on earth.
