Harvard researcher creates chemical system that mimics early cell behavior
A Harvard researcher seeking a model for the earliest cells has created a system that self-assembles from a chemical soup into cell-like structures that grow, move in response to light, replicate when destroyed, and exhibit signs of rudimentary evolutionary selection. While the system, developed by senior research fellow Juan Pérez-Mercader, mimics what one might conceive of as early cell behavior, a major caveat is that its main component is a polymer — a molecule not typically found in living things. Pérez-Mercader said that is by design. A physicist by training, Pérez-Mercader initiated the work to follow up on a paper he wrote in 2003 discussing mathematical models for some of the basic properties of life. The recent work, described in the open-access journal Scientific Report, is an attempt to use chemistry to translate those mathematical models into the real world, he said. “I am trying to build something that mimics life in a...