The emergence of interstellar molecular complexity explained by interacting networks

M. García-Sánchez, I. Jiménez-Serra, F. Puente-Sánchez, J. Aguirre

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Vol. 119, nº. 30, pp. e2119734119-1 - e2119734119-10

Summary:

Recent years have witnessed the detection of an increasing number of complex organic molecules in interstellar space, some of them being of prebiotic interest. Disentangling the origin of interstellar prebiotic chemistry and its connection to biochemistry and ultimately, to biology is an enormously challenging scientific goal where the application of complexity theory and network science has not been fully exploited. Encouraged by this idea, we present a theoretical and computational framework to model the evolution of simple networked structures toward complexity. In our environment, complex networks represent simplified chemical compounds and interact optimizing the dynamical importance of their nodes. We describe the emergence of a transition from simple networks toward complexity when the parameter representing the environment reaches a critical value. Notably, although our system does not attempt to model the rules of real chemistry nor is dependent on external input data, the results describe the emergence of complexity in the evolution of chemical diversity in the interstellar medium. Furthermore, they reveal an as yet unknown relationship between the abundances of molecules in dark clouds and the potential number of chemical reactions that yield them as products, supporting the ability of the conceptual framework presented here to shed light on real scenarios. Our work reinforces the notion that some of the properties that condition the extremely complex journey from the chemistry in space to prebiotic chemistry and finally, to life could show relatively simple and universal patterns.

Spanish layman's summary:

El origen de la vida está marcado por transiciones hacia la complejidad, desde la astroquímica a biomoléculas, hasta organismos vivos. Presentamos un modelo de grafos, donde las redes construyen los ladrillos básicos de la vida e interactúan para dar lugar a una gran diversidad de redes complejas.

 

English layman's summary:

The road to life is marked by transitions toward complexity, from astrochemistry to biomolecules and eventually to organisms. We present a computational model in which simple networks simulate the basic components of life and interact to form complex structures, leading to an explosion of diversity

 

JCR Impact Factor and WoS quartile: 11,100 - Q1 (2022); 9,400 - Q1 (2023)

DOI reference: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2119734119

Published on paper: July 2022.

Published on-line: July 2022.

Citation:
M. García-Sánchez, I. Jiménez-Serra, F. Puente-Sánchez, J. Aguirre, The emergence of interstellar molecular complexity explained by interacting networks. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. Vol. 119, nº. 30, pp. e2119734119-1 - e2119734119-10, July 2022. [Online: July 2022]