Molecular Origins of Life, Munich 2024

Jul 19, 2024, 8:25 AM → Jul 20, 2024, 5:50 PM Europe/Berlin

LMU Munich - Great (Große) Aula

The Molecular Origins of Life, Munich conference addresses one of the most fundamental questions of science: How could life originate? With 24 talks by renowned scientists accompanied by panel discussions and poster sessions, this international conference brings together scientists from a wide range of disciplines, namely: astronomy, bio-/chemistry, bio-/physics, geosciences and theoretical chemistry and physics. Together, we pave the way towards answering some of the most pertinent questions of humankind: What were the conditions on early Earth? Which chemicals could serve as precursors for the synthesis of living systems? How did the very first genetic material develop? How could Darwinian evolution emerge? What were the first metabolic pathways? The conference's aim is to represent and to discuss the state of the art in the Origin of Life field. 

The Molecular Origins of Life Munich 2024 is organized by DFG funded Collaborative Research Center 392 Molecular Evolution in Prebiotic Environments. Attendance to the event is free of charge.

Registration is mandatory to be able to attend the event.

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Fri, July 19

8:25 AM → 8:30 AM Opening Remarks

8:30 AM → 9:45 AM Session A

8:30 AM Spatial and temporal dynamics of fluid-rock interactions promoting organic synthesis in the terrestrial lithosphere

Speaker: Bénédicte Menez (IPG, Paris)

8:55 AM Engineering a synthetic protocell with RNA origami

Speaker: Kerstin Göpfrich (Heidelberg U.)

9:20 AM Before cells: Prebiotic compartments based on phase separation and molecular self-assembly

Speaker: Christine Keating (Penn State U.)

9:45 AM → 10:05 AM Session A: Discussion

10:05 AM → 10:30 AM Coffee Break

10:30 AM → 11:45 AM Session B

10:30 AM A Mechanistic Approach to Prebiotic Chemistry: Coenzymes, Chirality, and Catalysis

Speaker: Robert J. Mayer (TUM)

10:55 AM Probing the Origin of the Genetic Code by High-Throughput Sequencing

Speaker: Andres Jäschke (Heidelberg U.)

11:20 AM Phase separation directs polymerization and selects sequences

Speaker: Christoph Weber (Universität Augsburg, DE)

11:45 AM → 12:05 PM Session B: Discussion

12:05 PM → 1:30 PM Poster Session I

1:30 PM → 2:45 PM Session C

1:30 PM Cyclicphospholipids in the emergence of primitive (functional) protocells

Speaker: Ramanarayanan Krishnamurthy (Scripps Research)

1:55 PM The role of crystallization in prebiotic polymerization processes

Speaker: Judit E. Šponer (IBP)

2:20 PM Atmospheric HCN production and the emergence of the RNA world on early Earth

Speaker: Ralph Pudritz (McMaster University)

2:45 PM → 3:05 PM Session C: Discussion

3:05 PM → 3:30 PM Coffee Break

3:30 PM → 4:45 PM Session D

3:30 PM Is the Enantiomeric Excess in Meteorites (truly) the Missing Link to Understanding Biomolecular Homochirality?

Speaker: Cornelia Meinert (U. Côte d'Azur)

3:55 PM Possible roles of peptides in early life

Speaker: Klára Hlouchová (Charles U.)

4:20 PM Empowering Nucleic Acid Evolution with Expanded Genetic Alphabets

Speaker: Elisa Biondi (FfAME)

4:45 PM → 5:05 PM Session D: Discussion

5:05 PM → 5:10 PM Closing Remarks

Sat, July 20

8:25 AM → 8:30 AM Opening Remarks

8:30 AM → 9:45 AM Session E

8:30 AM Role of helicity in the nonenzymatic template-directed primer extension of DNA

Speaker: Amanda Ellis (University of Melbourne, AU)

8:55 AM Hadean Earth Recipes

Speaker: Stephen J. Mojzsis (Hungarian Academy of Sciences, HU)

9:20 AM Organic cofactors as connection between minerals and protometabolism?

Speaker: Martina Preiner (MPI for Terrestrial Microbiology)

9:45 AM → 10:05 AM Session E: Discussion

10:05 AM → 10:30 AM Coffee Break

10:30 AM → 11:45 AM Session F

10:30 AM Nucleic Acid Replication Enabled by Wet-Dry Cycles: A Robust Solution to the Product Inhibition Problem

Speaker: Martha Grover (Georgia Tech)

10:55 AM Exploring the habitability of ocean moons by in situ analysis of emitted ice grains

Speaker: Frank Postberg (FU Berlin)

11:20 AM Impacts of Environmental Parameters on Prebiotic Organic Reactions in Hydrothermal Systems

Speaker: Laurie Barge (NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, USA)

11:45 AM → 12:05 PM Session F: Discussion

12:05 PM → 1:30 PM Poster Session II

1:30 PM → 2:45 PM Session G

1:30 PM Towards Recreating a Metabolic Origin of Life

Speaker: Joseph Moran (U. Ottawa)

1:55 PM Toward an autonomous “artificial cell” in 2D

Speaker: Roy Bar-Ziv (Weizmann Institute of Science, IL)

2:20 PM Shaping early life: the chemistry of primitive compartments

Speaker: Claudia Bonfio (U. Strasbourg)

2:45 PM → 3:05 PM Session G: Discussion

3:05 PM → 3:30 PM Coffee Break

3:30 PM → 4:45 PM Session H

3:30 PM Challenging the Discontinuous Synthesis Model to Make Prebiotic Polyribonucleic Acid

Speaker: Steven Benner (FfAME)

3:55 PM Template-based copying in dynamic combinatorial libraries out of equilibrium

Speaker: Job Boekhoven (TUM, Germany)

4:20 PM Self-Assembly and Non-Enzymatic Polymerization of Plausible Proto-Nucleotides: A Model for Monomers and Polymers that Preceded RNA

Speaker: Nicholas Hud (Georgia Institute of Technology, USA)

4:45 PM → 5:05 PM Session H: Discussion

5:05 PM → 5:10 PM Closing Remarks