B11: Membranes as catalytic surfaces for prebiotic self-organization (Petra Schwille)
The hypothesis underlying this proposal is that early membranes could have played a key catalytic role for the origin of biological self-organization. In this project, we aim to investigate how pattern and gradient formation on membrane surfaces could have been implemented with early biomolecules, prior to the emergence of complex proteins. To this end, we will construct in a system of nucleic acids reaction design features of the bacterial MinDE proteins, one of the simplest known pattern-forming biological systems that our group has been functionally elucidating for the past years.