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Updated: Aug 4, 2026

Nucleoside Triphosphates - From Synthesis to Biochemical Characterization
Published on: April 3, 2014
New polyazaporphine chemistry for the origin of life
J F Neumer1, M D Gordon, C N McEwen
1E.I. Du Pont de Nemours & Co., Inc., Wilmington, Delaware 19898, USA.
Abstract:
Molecular orbital spectral predictions suggest that 2,5,7,10,12,15,17,20-octaaza-21H, 23H-porphine has a visible spectral range closely matching that of chlorophyll-a. Since the octaazaporphine is, in its core, a simple derivative of an (HCN)12 oligomer, this fact, together with its spectral properties, would suggest that it occupies a high rank as a primordial porphinic solar energy transducer for photochemistry essential to life's formation. The demonstration that the mass 324 hexahydrooctaazaporphine is formed in protic media by the cyclotetramerization of imidazol-4-aminohydroxonium ion or the derived nitrenium ion, and that a mass 318 species consonant with that of the Huckel aromatic octaazaporphine is observed in the course of these studies, strongly supports the proposed octaazaporphine synthesis in a prebiotic hydrocyanic acid milieu.
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