Different Organic Compounds And Many Amino Acids example essay topic

Alexander Oparin and J.B.S. Haldane developed a theory of Biogenesis between the years of 1922 and 1928. With Oparin's "The Origin of Life" and Haldane's technical papers they created concrete hypothetical models from their knowledge of physics and biochemistry. Their only obstacle was practical proof to base their discoveries upon. Oparin speculated that Earth, in its early stages, had several different reactions occurring caused by nature. Organic compounds formed out of inorganic material that could have developed into the first organic cells and then into living organisms. Many different chemical reactions occurred during the formation of the Earth's crust with the cooling temperatures of the atmosphere.

These organic compounds irrigated down from the "hot pools" of water through the flooding rains and continuous blasts of lightning that were plaguing the Earth. Within these "hot pools" of water, Oparin believed that carbon bonds, along with fatty acids, sugars, and tannins, formed in ever-larger molecular chains. They believed that with time, amino acids (essential to protein) could have spontaneously fabricated. During the first phase of the Earth's history, over a billion years, combinations of hydrocarbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, and ammonia were always producing an unlimited assortment of organic compounds that caste intricate molecules which became the building blocks of living cells.

Haldane was convinced that the earth was covered with a "hot dilute soup" at this time and within these "soups", pre-biological reactions occurred. From the synthesis of proteins, the development of life began to emerge. In 1953, Stanley Miller, a biochemist, completed his study at the University of Chicago that started the formation of the empirical foundations to the understanding of how humans might have evolved. He used Oparin and Haladane's theory to recreate the primitive Earth in a laboratory.

The foundation of life was only possible with carbon and the methane that he combined with ammonia and hydrogen contained carbon. The combination of these chemicals, within a glass instrument, and the vapors from boiling water passed through glass tubes and crossed two tungsten electrodes (which produced a prolonged electric spark) and created gases. Within seven days, different organic compounds and many amino acids had formed in the brownish liquid that was in the gases when it was pumped out for study. The astounding outcome noted by Miller were that "the major products were not themselves a random selection of organic compounds but included a surprising number of substances that occur in living organisms". Since Miller's studies, substantial research has been performed on the theory of Biogenesis. Scientist have continued to combine different gases with other types of energy and the molecules in each experiment were synthesized.

The conditions recreated of the prehistoric Earth in the laboratory, have lead to the creation of the necessary components for all living things. Carbon chains, polypeptides, ATP, porphyrins, microspheres (proteinoids), purines and pyrimidines, and the first mammalian gene were all synthesized in laboratories using the Biogenesis theory. The creation of the catalytic enzyme, ATP, which supplies the basic source of metabolic energy in living systems and porphyrins, molecules that function like plants in being able to utilize light to store energy, Miller believes that "almost certainly they became important for the metabolic processes leading to ATP synthesis early in the evolution of life". Also, the production of proteinoids, which looked and acted like living protein cells, showed that reproduction was possible to continue with cells that were ingesting certain substances. Cessation of growth with the parent cell would cause the replicated cells to reproduce their own offspring.

In addition to theses developments, the fusion of purines and pyrimidines created the five intended nucleic acid bases that are adenine and guanine, cytosine, uracil, and thymine. They were combined with sugars and phosphates to produce nucleotides. The formed nucleotides are the essential links in the DNA gene codes for all living things on Earth and leads experts to consider that these molecules could have formed easily on the prehistoric Earth. These developments are not creating life in the laboratory so far, but they are significant strides near that for upcoming discoveries. The power of humans to control their own evolution is called the "grand transition".

The future of our civilization and the human race itself will be affected, I think, positive in some aspects and negative in other aspects from this velocity of control. For religion, the economy, and legal issues it possibly will be a negative force to exercise. Most religions would oppose the production of life in a laboratory. The faith of western religion may possibly be jeopardized since Christians have been taught that there is only one creator, God. Economically, creation of life other than by natural means could cause over population, famine, extinction of animals (due to our development into their homes) and many other disasters.

Many Christians would say, if nature (God) intended on every living being to bear offspring, there would never be cause for the inability of a female to become pregnant, still born babies, or death of any human or animal. Over population of every thing living would ultimately lead to the destruction of living beings. Finally, legal issues on creating life in a lab might become very deep. If a human's sperm is frozen and death occurs, who would own the sperm? Would the spouse, his parents, or her parents, the children?

All of these questions would have to be considered. Equally as important, the political affect could be negative or positive, depending on which party supports or does not support the issue. Each party usually supports different issues like health care, education, and abortion etc. but the fate of the issue's success would be on whichever party was selected to office and whether it was supported or not. Despite these negative outcomes, the culture of the United States, today, would probably embrace it positively.

The youth of America is a bit more inquisitive than those of the past and the idea of creating life more than likely would be very interesting. Ultimately, to me, the issue goes back to Reverend Taylor and how he feels that we can no longer live in the past. That structured framework no longer works and in order for life to be fulfilled changes are going to have to occur in the human thought process. New ideas must develop to prevail in the viscous circles of life.

James L. Christian, PHILOSOPHY An Introduction to the Art of Wondering, 8th ed. (Belmont: Wadsworth / Thomson Learning, 2003) 391. Christian 391. Fred Taylor, Roll Away The Stone (Great Falls: Information International, 1999) 3.