Oligomer biology and polymer biology: primitive RNA-protein interactions

It is discussed that oligopeptides extracted from the active centers of aminoacyl-tRNA-synthetases, peptidyl-transferases, and template-directed RNA polymerases can mimic the catalytic activities of each enzyme. Hairpin type primitive tRNAs with the anticodon at the 5' end were specifically aminoacylated from the cognate aminoacyladenylates in the above scheme. These results suggest that primitive RNA-protein interactions among oligomers of ribonucleotides and amino acids might have played an important role in the self-organization of the biomolecules in the early history of life.