Nonenzymatic polymerase-like template-directed synthesis of acyclic l-threoninol nucleic acid

Abstract

A world preceding the prebiotic RNA-world may have been based on xeno nucleic acids (XNAs), but their replication likely did not require enzymes. Here, the authors demonstrate template-directed non-enzymatic synthesis of an XNA, acyclic l-threoninol nucleic acid, via chemical ligation mediated by N-cyanoimidazole, and achieve a pseudo-primer extension of this XNA with all four nucleobases.