Overview
- The paper, published in Science Advances in early August 2026, brings together computational ordering of about 420 core metabolic reactions with genome and protein‑structure comparisons and laboratory chemistry.
- The authors report that bacteria and archaea each evolved structurally different enzymes to carry out the same core reactions, which the team interprets as two separate transitions to free‑living cellular life.
- Their reconstruction identifies four phases of catalysis: a metal‑only phase, a metal–enzyme hybrid phase represented by LUCA, and then divergent enzyme‑driven evolution in the bacterial and archaeal lineages.
- Laboratory experiments show that minerals and reagents found at hydrothermal vents, notably phosphite with palladium catalysts, can drive phosphorylation reactions in water that could substitute for early ATP‑dependent chemistry.
- The study reframes LUCA as partly environment dependent and prompts further tests and debate because its conclusions rest on new algorithms, comparative structural inferences and experimental chemistry that require replication and critique by the field.