Can anyone in the group help me find this article on the net, or do you know the hypothesis Black is suggesting?
Here is what I know.
Black, S. 1973 A theory on the origin of life. Adv. in Enzymology 38, 193-234. "Black suggests that some early peptides might have served as templates for the aggregation of nucleotides that may have then bonded together to form a precise mold for the replication of these same peptides. This view has the advantage of offering a mechanism by which the replication of both peptide chains and nucleotide chiains would have been interdependent from the start. Also as one chain lengthens during further evolution, so does the other, each gradually improving its replicatory role until some of the pesent features of nucleic acid replication and protein synthesis evolve. Unfortunately as with naked genes, we still find it difficult to imagine the spontaneous origin of such a precisely organized nucelic acid template." Strickberger, Evolution.
Comment: as to the last concern, I would suggest that the heat cycle would drive the process thus eliminateing the 'difficult to imagine' question.
