The Energetics and Habitat of Metabolic Origin

Project Information

EcolMetabOrigin

Grant agreement ID: 101018894

DOI

10.3030/101018894

EC signature date 1 May 2021

Start date 1 November 2021

End date 31 October 2026

Funded under

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)

Total cost

€ 2 490 000,00

EU contribution

€ 2 490 000,00

Coordinated by

HEINRICH-HEINE-UNIVERSITAET DUESSELDORF
Germany

CORDIS provides links to public deliverables and publications of HORIZON projects.

Links to deliverables and publications from FP7 projects, as well as links to some specific result types such as dataset and software, are dynamically retrieved from OpenAIRE .

Publications

Peer reviewed articles (28)

ATP requirements for growth reveal the bioenergetic impact of mitochondrial symbiosis

Author(s): William F. Martin
Published in: Biochimica et Biophysica Acta (BBA) - Bioenergetics, Issue 1866, 2025, Page(s) 149564, ISSN 0005-2728
Publisher: Elsevier BV
DOI: 10.1016/j.bbabio.2025.149564

Serpentinization as the source of energy, electrons, organics, catalysts, nutrients and pH gradients for the origin of LUCA and life

Author(s): Schwander L, Brabender M, Mrnjavac N, Wimmer JLE, Preiner M, Martin WF
Published in: Frontiers in Microbiology, Issue 14, 2023, Page(s) 1257597, ISSN 1664-302X
Publisher: Frontiers Media
DOI: 10.3389/fmicb.2023.1257597

GTP before ATP: The energy currency at the origin of genes

Author(s): Natalia Mrnjavac, William F. Martin
Published in: Biochimica et Biophysica Acta (BBA) - Bioenergetics, Issue 1866, 2024, Page(s) 149514, ISSN 0005-2728
Publisher: Elsevier BV
DOI: 10.1016/j.bbabio.2024.149514

Gene Duplications Are At Least 50 Times Less Frequent than Gene Transfers in Prokaryotic Genomes

Author(s): Fernando D K Tria, William F Martin
Published in: Genome Biology and Evolution, Issue 13/10, 2021, ISSN 1759-6653
Publisher: Oxford University Press
DOI: 10.1093/gbe/evab224

Ambient temperature CO2 fixation to pyruvate and subsequently to citramalate over iron and nickel nanoparticles

Author(s): Beyazay T, Belthle KS, Farès C, Preiner M, Moran J, Martin WF, Tüysüz H
Published in: Nature Communications, Issue 14, 2023, Page(s) 570, ISSN 2041-1723
Publisher: Nature Publishing Group
DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-36088-w

Synergistic Effects of Silica‐Supported Iron−Cobalt Catalysts for CO₂ Reduction to Prebiotic Organics

Author(s): Kendra S. Belthle, William F. Martin, Harun Tüysüz
Published in: ChemCatChem, Issue 16, 2024, ISSN 1867-3880
Publisher: Wiley - VCH Verlag GmbH & CO. KGaA
DOI: 10.1002/cctc.202301218

Narrowing gaps between Earth and life

Author(s): Martin WF
Published in: Proc Natl Acad Sci USA, 2022, ISSN 0027-8424
Publisher: National Academy of Sciences
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2216017119

Conversion of pyridoxal to pyridoxamine with <scp>NH</scp>₃ and <scp>H</scp>₂ on nickel generates a protometabolic nitrogen shuttle under serpentinizing conditions

Author(s): Manon Laura Schlikker, Max Brabender, Loraine Schwander, Carolina Garcia Garcia, Maximillian Burmeister, Sabine Metzger, Joseph Moran, William F. Martin
Published in: The FEBS Journal, 2024, ISSN 1742-464X
Publisher: Blackwell Publishing Inc.
DOI: 10.1111/febs.17357

Pyrophosphate and Irreversibility in Evolution, or why PPi Is Not an Energy Currency and why Nature Chose Triphosphates

Author(s): Jessica L. E. Wimmer, Karl Kleinermanns, William F. Martin
Published in: Frontiers in Microbiology, Issue 12, 2021, ISSN 1664-302X
Publisher: Frontiers Media
DOI: 10.3389/fmicb.2021.759359

The ancestral mitotic state: Closed orthomitosis with intranuclear spindles in the syncytial last eukaryotic common ancestor.

Author(s): Bremer N, Tria FDK, Skejo J, Martin WF
Published in: Genome Biology and Evolution, 2023, ISSN 1759-6653
Publisher: Oxford University Press
DOI: 10.1093/gbe/evad016

A prebiotic Krebs cycle analog generates amino acids with H2 and NH3 over nickel

Author(s): Kaur H, Rauscher SA, Werner E, Song Y, Yi J, Kazöne W, Martin WF, Tüysüz H, Moran J
Published in: Chem, Issue 10, 2024, Page(s) 1-13, ISSN 2451-9294
Publisher: Cell Press
DOI: 10.1016/j.chempr.2024.02.001

Direct synthesis of formamide from CO2 and H2O with nickel–iron nitride heterostructures under mild hydrothermal conditions

Author(s): Beyazay T, Martin WF, Tüysüz H
Published in: Journal of the American Chemical Society, Issue 145, 2023, Page(s) 19768–19779, ISSN 0002-7863
Publisher: American Chemical Society
DOI: 10.1021/jacs.3c05412

Ancestral state reconstructions trace mitochondria but not phagocytosis to the last eukaryotic common ancestor

Author(s): Bremer N, Tria FDK, Skejo J, Garg SG, Martin WF
Published in: Genome Biology and Evolution, 2022, ISSN 1759-6653
Publisher: Oxford University Press
DOI: 10.1093/gbe/evac079

Chemiosmotic ATP synthesis by minimal protocells

Author(s): Fanchen Yu, Jinbo Fei, Yi Jia, Tonghui Wang, William F. Martin, Junbai Li
Published in: Cell Reports Physical Science, Issue 6, 2025, Page(s) 102461, ISSN 2666-3864
Publisher: Elsevier BV
DOI: 10.1016/j.xcrp.2025.102461

Ferredoxin reduction by hydrogen with iron functions as an evolutionary precursor of flavin-based electron bifurcation

Author(s): Brabender M, Henriques Pereira DP, Mrnjavac N, Schlikker ML, Kimura Z-I, Sucharitakul J, Kleinermanns K, Tüysüz H, Buckel W, Preiner M, Martin WF
Published in: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Issue 121, 2024, Page(s) e2318969121, ISSN 0027-8424
Publisher: National Academy of Sciences
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2318969121

Archaeal pseudomurein and bacterial murein cell wall biosynthesis share a common evolutionary ancestry

Author(s): Bishwa P. Subedi, William F. Martin, Vincenzo Carbone, Eduardus C. Duin, Bryan Cronin, Julia Sauter, Linley R. Schofield, Andrew J. Sutherland-Smith, Ron S. Ronimus
Published in: FEMS Microbes, 2021, ISSN 2633-6685
Publisher: Oxford University Press
DOI: 10.1093/femsmc/xtab012

Cryptic diversity of cellulose-degrading gut bacteria in industrialized humans

Author(s): Moraïs S, Winkler S, Zorea A, Levin L, Nagies FSP, Kapust N, Lamed E, Artan-Furman A, Bolam DN, Yadav MP, Bayer EA, Martin WF, Mizrahi I
Published in: Science, 2024, Page(s) eadj9223, ISSN 0036-8075
Publisher: American Association for the Advancement of Science
DOI: 10.1126/science.adj9223

The Moon-forming impact and the autotrophic origin of life

Author(s): Mrnjavac N, Wimmer JLE, Brabender M, Schwander L, Martin WF
Published in: ChemPlusChem, 2023, Page(s) e202300270, ISSN 2192-6506
Publisher: Wiley-VCH Verlag
DOI: 10.1002/cplu.202300270

Chemical Antiquity in Metabolism

Author(s): Natalia Mrnjavac, Loraine Schwander, Max Brabender, William F. Martin
Published in: Accounts of Chemical Research, Issue 57, 2024, Page(s) 2267-2278, ISSN 0001-4842
Publisher: American Chemical Society
DOI: 10.1021/acs.accounts.4c00226

The radical impact of oxygen on prokaryotic evolution—enzyme inhibition first, uninhibited essential biosyntheses second, aerobic respiration third

Author(s): Natalia Mrnjavac, Falk S. P. Nagies, Jessica L. E. Wimmer, Nils Kapust, Michael R. Knopp, Katharina Trost, Luca Modjewski, Nico Bremer, Marek Mentel, Mauro Degli Esposti, Itzhak Mizrahi, John F. Allen, William F. Martin
Published in: FEBS Letters, Issue 598, 2024, Page(s) 1692-1714, ISSN 0014-5793
Publisher: Elsevier BV
DOI: 10.1002/1873-3468.14906

Evidence for corrin biosynthesis in the last universal common ancestor

Author(s): Luca D. Modjewski, Val Karavaeva, Natalia Mrnjavac, Michael Knopp, William F. Martin, Filipa L. Sousa
Published in: The FEBS Journal, Issue 292, 2025, Page(s) 827-850, ISSN 1742-464X
Publisher: Blackwell Publishing Inc.
DOI: 10.1111/febs.17367

Role of geochemical protoenzymes (geozymes) in primordial metabolism: specific abiotic hydride transfer by metals to the biological redox cofactor NAD+

Author(s): Delfina P. Henriques Pereira, Jana Leethaus, Tugce Beyazay, Andrey do Nascimento Vieira, Karl Kleinermanns, Harun Tüysüz, William F. Martin, Martina Preiner
Published in: The FEBS Journal, Issue 289, 2022, Page(s) 3148-3162, ISSN 1742-464X
Publisher: Blackwell Publishing Inc.
DOI: 10.1111/febs.16329

Realistic Gene Transfer to Gene Duplication Ratios Identify Different Roots in the Bacterial Phylogeny Using a Tree Reconciliation Method.

Author(s): Nico Bremer; Michael Knopp; William F. Martin; Fernando D. K. Tria
Published in: Life; Volume 12; Issue 7; Pages: 995, Issue 1, 2022, ISSN 2075-1729
Publisher: MDPI AG
DOI: 10.3390/life12070995

The early evolution of the glycolytic pathway from autotrophic origins to glycogen and back

Author(s): Luca D Modjewski, Ulrike Johnsen, Peter Schönheit, William F Martin
Published in: FEMS Microbiology Reviews, Issue 49, 2025, ISSN 1574-6976
Publisher: Oxford University Press (OUP)
DOI: 10.1093/femsre/fuaf049

Three enzymes governed the rise of O2 on Earth

Author(s): Natalia Mrnjavac, Mauro Degli Esposti, Itzhak Mizrahi, William F. Martin, John F. Allen
Published in: Biochimica et Biophysica Acta (BBA) - Bioenergetics, Issue 1865, 2024, Page(s) 149495, ISSN 0005-2728
Publisher: Elsevier BV
DOI: 10.1016/j.bbabio.2024.149495

Surprising effects of differential loss in genome evolution: the last-one-out

Author(s): Nico Bremer, William F Martin, Mike Steel
Published in: FEMS Microbiology Letters, Issue 372, 2025, ISSN 1574-6968
Publisher: Oxford University Press (OUP)
DOI: 10.1093/femsle/fnaf051

Energy at Origins: Favorable Thermodynamics of Biosynthetic Reactions in the Last Universal Common Ancestor (LUCA)

Author(s): Jessica L. E. Wimmer; Joana C. Xavier; Andrey d. N. Vieira; Delfina P. H. Pereira; Jacqueline Leidner; Filipa L. Sousa; Karl Kleinermanns; Martina Preiner; William F. Martin
Published in: Frontiers in Microbiology, Issue 1, 2021, ISSN 1664-302X
Publisher: Frontiers Media
DOI: 10.3389/fmicb.2021.793664

A universal and constant rate of gene content change traces pangenome flux to LUCA

Author(s): Katharina Trost, Michael R Knopp, Jessica L E Wimmer, Fernando D K Tria, William F Martin
Published in: FEMS Microbiology Letters, Issue 371, 2024, ISSN 1574-6968
Publisher: Oxford University Press
DOI: 10.1093/femsle/fnae068