Origin and Evolution of Cells

Cells are divided into two main classes, initially defined by whether they contain a
nucleus. Prokaryotic cells (bacteria) lack a nuclear envelope; eukaryotic cells have
a nucleus in which the genetic material is separated from the cytoplasm.
Prokaryotic cells are generally smaller and simpler than eukaryotic cells; in
addition to the absence of a nucleus, their genomes are less complex and they do
not contain cytoplasmic organelles or a cytoskeleton . In spite of these
differences, the same basic molecular mechanisms govern the lives of both
prokaryotes and eukaryotes, indicating that all present-day cells are descended
from a single primordial ancestor. How did this first cell develop? And how did the
complexity and diversity exhibited by present-day cells evolve?

Prokaryotic
The First Cell
It appears that life first emerged at least 3.8 billion years ago, approximately 750
million years after Earth was formed.. How life originated and how the first cell
came into being are matters of speculation, since these events cannot be
reproduced in the laboratory. Nonetheless, several types of experiments provide
important evidence bearing on some steps of the process.
Time scale of evolution.
Time scale of evolution. The scale indicates the approximate times at which some
of the major events in the evolution of cells are thought to have occurred.
It was first suggested in the 1920s that simple organic molecules could form and
spontaneously polymerize into macromolecules under the conditions thought to
exist in primitive Earth's atmosphere. At the time life arose, the atmosphere of
Earth is thought to have contained little or no free oxygen, instead consisting
principally of CO2 and N2 in addition to smaller amounts of gases such as H2, H2S,
and CO. Such an atmosphere provides reducing conditions in which organic
molecules, given a source of energy such as sunlight or electrical discharge, can
form spontaneously. The spontaneous formation of organic molecules was first
demonstrated experimentally in the 1950s, when Stanley Miller (then a graduate
student) showed that the discharge of electric sparks into a mixture of H2, CH4,
and NH3, in the presence of water, led to the formation of a variety of organic
molecules, including several amino acids (Figure 1.2). Although Miller's
experiments did not precisely reproduce the conditions of primitive Earth, they
clearly demonstrated the plausibility of the spontaneous synthesis of organic
molecules, providing the basic materials from which the first living organisms
arose.

Spontaneous formation of organic molecules.

Spontaneous formation of organic molecules. Water vapor was refluxed through
an atmosphere consisting of CH4, NH3, and H2, into which electric sparks were
discharged. Analysis of the reaction products revealed the formation of a variety
of organic molecules.
The next step in evolution was the formation of macromolecules. The monomeric
building blocks of macromolecules have been demonstrated to polymerize
spontaneously under plausible prebiotic conditions. Heating dry mixtures of
amino acids, for example, results in their polymerization to form polypeptides.
But the critical characteristic of the macromolecule from which life evolved must
have been the ability to replicate itself. Only a macromolecule capable of
directing the synthesis of new copies of itself would have been capable of
reproduction and further evolution.
Of the two major classes of informational macromolecules in present-day cells
(nucleic acids and proteins), only the nucleic acids are capable of directing their
own self-replication. Nucleic acids can serve as templates for their own synthesis
as a result of specific base pairing between complementary nucleotides . A critical
step in understanding molecular evolution was thus reached in the early 1980s,
when it was discovered in the laboratories of Sid Altman and Tom Cech that RNA
is capable of catalyzing a number of chemical reactions, including the
polymerization of nucleotides. RNA is thus uniquely able both to serve as a
template for and to catalyze its own replication. Consequently, RNA is generally
believed to have been the initial genetic system, and an early stage of chemical
evolution is thought to have been based on self-replicating RNA molecules—a
period of evolution known as the RNA world. Ordered interactions between RNA
and amino acids then evolved into the present-day genetic code, and DNA
eventually replaced RNA as the genetic material.

Self-replication of RNA.
Self-replication of RNA. Complementary pairing between nucleotides (adenine [A]
with uracil [U] and guanine [G] with cytosine [C]) allows one strand of RNA to
serve as a template for the synthesis of a new strand with the complementary
sequence.
The first cell is presumed to have arisen by the enclosure of self-replicating RNA in
a membrane composed of phospholipids (Figure 1.4). As discussed in detail in the
next chapter, phospholipids are the basic components of all present-day
biological membranes, including the plasma membranes of both prokaryotic and
eukaryotic cells. The key characteristic of the phospholipids that form membranes
is that they are amphipathic molecules, meaning that one portion of the molecule
is soluble in water and another portion is not. Phospholipids have long, water-
insoluble (hydrophobic) hydrocarbon chains joined to water-soluble (hydrophilic)
head groups that contain phosphate. When placed in water, phospholipids
spontaneously aggregate into a bilayer with their phosphate-containing head
groups on the outside in contact with water and their hydrocarbon tails in the
interior in contact with each other. Such a phospholipid bilayer forms a stable
barrier between two aqueous compartments—for example, separating the
interior of the cell from its external environment.
Enclosure of self-replicating RNA in a phospholipid membrane. The first cell is
thought to have arisen by the enclosure of self-replicating RNA and associated
molecules in a membrane composed of phospholipids. Each phospholipid
molecule has two long hydrophobic.
The enclosure of self-replicating RNA and associated molecules in a phospholipid
membrane would thus have maintained them as a unit, capable of self-
reproduction and further evolution. RNA-directed protein synthesis may already
have evolved by this time, in which case the first cell would have consisted of self-
replicating RNA and its encoded proteins.
The Evolution of Metabolism
Because cells originated in a sea of organic molecules, they were able to obtain
food and energy directly from their environment. But such a situation is self-
limiting, so cells needed to evolve their own mechanisms for generating energy
and synthesizing the molecules necessary for their replication. The generation
and controlled utilization of metabolic energy is central to all celactivities, and the
principal pathways of energy metabolism are highly conserved in present-day
cells. All cells use adenosine 5′-triphosphate (ATP) as their source of metabolic
energy to drive the synthesis of cell constituents and carry out other energy-
requiring activities, such as movement (e.g., muscle contraction). The
mechanisms used by cells for the generation of ATP are thought to have evolved
in three stages, corresponding to the evolution of glycolysis, photosynthesis, and
oxidative metabolism . The development of these metabolic pathways changed
Earth's atmosphere, thereby altering the course of further evolution.

Generation of metabolic energy.

Generation of metabolic energy. Glycolysis is the anaerobic breakdown of glucose
to lactic acid. Photosynthesis utilizes energy from sunlight to drive the synthesis
of glucose from CO2 and H2O, with the release of O2 as a by-product.
In the initially anaerobic atmosphere of Earth, the first energy-generating
reactions presumably involved the breakdown of organic molecules in the
absence of oxygen. These reactions are likely to have been a form of present-day
glycolysis—the anaerobic breakdown of glucose to lactic acid, with the net energy
gain of two molecules of ATP. In addition to using ATP as their source of
intracellular chemical energy, all present-day cells carry out glycolysis, consistent
with the notion that these reactions arose very early in evolution.
Glycolysis provided a mechanism by which the energy in preformed organic
molecules (e.g., glucose) could be converted to ATP, which could then be used as
a source of energy to drive other metabolic reactions. The development of
photosynthesis is generally thought to have been the next major evolutionary
step, which allowed the cell to harness energy from sunlight and provided
independence from the utilization of preformed organic molecules. The first
photosynthetic bacteria, which evolved more than 3 billion years ago, probably
utilized H2S to convert CO2 to organic molecules—a pathway of photosynthesis
still used by some bacteria. The use of H2O as a donor of electrons and hydrogen
for the conversion of CO2 to organic compounds evolved later and had the
important consequence of changing Earth's atmosphere. The use of H2O in
photosynthetic reactions produces the by-product free O2; this mechanism is
thought to have been responsible for making O2 abundant in Earth's atmosphere.

The release of O2 as a consequence of photosynthesis changed the environment

in which cells evolved and is commonly thought to have led to the development
of oxidative metabolism. Alternatively, oxidative metabolism may have evolved
before photosynthesis, with the increase in atmospheric O2 then providing a
strong selective advantage for organisms capable of using O2 in energy-producing
reactions. In either case, O2 is a highly reactive molecule, and oxidative
metabolism, utilizing this reactivity, has provided a mechanism for generating
energy from organic molecules that is much more efficient than anaerobic
glycolysis. For example, the complete oxidative breakdown of glucose to CO2 and
H2O yields energy equivalent to that of 36 to 38 molecules of ATP, in contrast to
the 2 ATP molecules formed by anaerobic glycolysis. With few exceptions,
present-day cells use oxidative reactions as their principal source of energy

Lamarckism
Lamarckism, a theory of evolution based on the principle that physical changes in
organisms during their lifetime—such as greater development of an organ or a
part through increased use—could be transmitted to their offspring. The doctrine,
proposed by the French naturalist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck in 1809, influenced
evolutionary thought through most of the 19th century. Lamarckism was
discredited by most geneticists after the 1930s, but certain of its ideas continued
to be held in the Soviet Union into the mid-20th century.

Acquired Characteristics
Biologists define an acquired characteristic as one that has developed in the
course of the life of an individual in the somatic or body cells, usually as a direct
response to some external change in the environment or through the use or
disuse of a part. The inheritance of such a characteristic means its reappearance
in one or more individuals in the next or in succeeding generations. An example
would be found in the supposed inheritance of a change brought about by the use
and disuse of a special organ. The blacksmith’s arm (or any other set of muscles)
enlarges when used continually against an external resistance, such as the weight
of the hammer. If the effect were inherited, the smith’s children at birth would
have unusually large arms—if not at birth, then when they became adults, even
though they had not used their arms excessively. There is no evidence supporting
this case. A more subtle illustration is found in the supposed inheritance of an
increased dexterity of the hands of a musician through practice. The skill
acquired, although causing no visible increase in the size of the fingers, might be
imagined to be passed along to the musician’s children, and they might then be
expected to play skillfully with minimal practice. Just how the intricate interplay
of cerebral sequences that has given the dexterity to the musician’s fingers could
ever be transferred to the musician’s sex cells (spermatozoa or ova), and through
them to any potential children, has never been brought within the range of
biological possibilities.

Lamarckism giraffe
Jean-Baptiste Lamarck proposed that acquired characteristics were inheritable.
For example, as a giraffe stretches its neck to browse higher in trees, the
continuation of the habit over an extended period results in a gradual lengthening
of the limbs and neck.
The examples that Lamarck gives to illustrate his doctrine are illuminating. In
animals, as stated above, a new environment calls forth new needs, and the
animal seeks to satisfy them by making some effort. Thus, new needs engender
new habits, which modify the parts. The effects are inherited. For example, the
giraffe, seeking to browse higher and higher on the leaves of trees on which it
feeds, stretches its neck. As a result of this habit, continued for a long time in all
the individuals of the species, the giraffe’s front limbs and neck have gradually
grown longer. Birds that need to rest on the water—i.e., to find their food—
spread out their feet when they wish to swim. The skin becomes accustomed to
being stretched and forms the web between the toes. The horns of ruminants
have resulted from the ruminants’ butting their heads together during combats.
These examples, which appear naive in light of later discoveries, constitute some
of the evidence on which Lamarck rested his theory.

What is Natural Selection?

Natural selection is the process in nature by which organisms better adapted to
their environment tend to survive and reproduce more than those less adapted to
their environment.

Natural Selection
Natural selection is the term that’s used to refer to the natural evolution over
time of a species in which only the genes that help it adapt and survive are
present. This idea was reported by Charles Darwin, the researcher behind many of
our modern concepts of evolution. In natural selection, a population will show
genetic traits over many generations that help it remain best suited to its
environment. These can be physical, structural traits like a skeleton or
musculature that helps it live in that setting, or can even by physiological traits
such as the presence of an enzyme in the digestive tract to help it break down the
available food sources.
Examples of natural selection

1. Skeletal Adaptations
Giraffes, lizards, and many other known species adapted to their environments
through genetic changes to their skeletons. This form of natural selection meant
that members of the population who didn’t develop and present these skeletal
changes died out. For example, giraffes developed long necks to reach food
sources higher up in trees, so members of the giraffe population who didn’t
develop a long neck died out. At the same time, certain lizards in one region
developed longer leg bones to help it climb up during periods of flood and to
escape predators in the ground; shorter legged lizards of the same population
died out until only the lizards with the long legs survived..

2. Coloration
Many species have been studied who’ve adapted to their environment through
adaptions in coloring. Once the optimal coloration is present, natural selection
occurs when members of the species without the adaptive coloring died out more
quickly and therefore didn’t reproduce as abundantly. Some example include the
deer mouse, the peppered moth, and the peacock.

3. Bacteria
Bacteria are a common research subject when studying evolution and adaptation
because some colonies of bacteria can produce several generations in one day,
letting researchers see a “fast forward” version of evolution and natural selection.
Some observed bacteria have included some who’ve adapted to new food sources
that were previously unusable, as bacteria that have adapted to the presence of
deadly antibiotics and exhibited traits that let them not only survive, but
reproduce to generate offspring that are also resistant to the antibiotic.

4. Physiological
Different species go through changes over time that help them adapt to different
environments, and humans are no different. One of the physiological changes
that different groups of human beings have made involves the ability to digest
cow’s milk. In regions where cattle are not raised, the human population is often
lactose intolerant, lacking the enzyme to break down the milk. However, in
regions where cattle are grown domestically and their milk is used as a chief part
of the food supply, those humans as a whole produce the enzyme needed to
digest milk.
Emergence of eukaryotes
Theory of symbiogenesis
The concept of symbiogenesis was introduced in 1909 by the Russian biologist
Constantin Merezhkowsky as “the origin of organisms by the combination or by
the association of two or several beings which enter into symbiosis”. In this article
we develop this idea, associated to the Freeman Dyson’s hypothesis, applied to
the early evolutive stages of life, considering that it could be a possible main rule
in the appearance and development of life conditions on Earth and elsewhere. A
cooperative, synergistic strategy should be considered as having been the
determinant in the development of the survival of the fittest, especially under
extremely adverse environmental conditions. This concept must be also applied
to the first communities of cells as the base supporting evolution of the early
“tree of life”. Cells, like we have previously described, can be included in a new
cellular concept entitled, “symbiocell”, since survival of the community under
such adverse conditions required a cooperative, synergistic strategy. Similar
principles could also be used to understand chemical pre-biotic evolution. We
believe that astrobiologists should consider it as a new approach to understand
organic and biological evolution.

1. INTRODUCTION
In his classic 1941 paper “Astrobiology”1, Laurence J. Lafleur discusses the
conditions of the origin of life in the universe, pointing out that “the process of
evolution depends upon de gradual accretion of relative minute variations or
mutations, and the occurance of these evolutionary elements is recognized to be
a matter of chance”. The author also discusses the problem in a broader
multitude approach than the quoted phrase, concluding “that life in the universe
is not confined to our planet”. Even if it was written in the 40’s, this perspective,
related to the problem of origin of life in the universe, represents an exception to
the major scientific thought of that time and the rest of the century. It also
includes, however, some limitations to the subject, not only in the scientific and
technological knowledge, as expected, but also in the epistemological way we
must understand the evolution of life. Based on the neo-Darwinian theory that is
the main approach we can offer when we look at the origin of life. Still, we believe
that other approaches could be implemented, namely using symbiogenic
principles. It is on this new vision that this paper will focus.

2. THE SYMBIOGENIC APPROACH

The origin or origins of life is still an open problem. Usually we consider Aleksandr
Oparin and John Haldane’s ideas, published in 1924 and 1929, respectively, as the
main sources for the development of the modern thinking on the origins of life,
but it was Constantin Merezhkowsky, a Russian biologist, who in 1909 in the work
“The Theory of two Plasms as Foundation of Symbiogenesis, New Doctrine on the
Origin of Organisms” pointed out the importance of extremophiles and extreme
environments in the early stages of life on Earth2. In that paper Merezhkowsky
introduces, for the first time, symbiogenic principles to understand the evolution
of life under extremelly adverse environmental conditions. This scenario,
reconsidered in recent years, is the base of a new paradigm to understand organic
and biological evolution on Earth and eventually elsewhere. It was also in that
article that Merezhkowsky introduced the symbiogenesis concept, defined as “the
origin of organisms through the combination or association of two or more .
Beings that enter in symbiosis”. According to this concept, symbiogenesis should
be understood as an evolutive mechanism and symbiosis as the vehicle, through
which that mechanism unfolds. This fact represents a point of view which is
opposed to that of the neo-Darwinism or Modern Synthesis Theory. Thus,
according to today’s dominant theory, evolution is a gradual process essentially
consisting of a natural selection conducted on minimal phenotypical variations,
which are a product of genetic and chromosome exchange. To put it in a nut shell,
is the development of life a saltational symbiotic process or a gradual process,
oriented by natural selection and leading organisms to adaptation? Especially
since 1859, the year of the publication of Charles Darwin’s book “On the Origin of
Species”, evolution has been considered as the fundamental concept and
organizing factor of modern Biology, as well as its structural pillar. Without
denying many of the Darwinist principles, the worse thing we could do within the
study of the process of evolution would be to mix up or limit evolution to the
Darwinist or neo-Darwinist perspective. These points of view are mainly used to
explain the biological evolution, contributing to the generalized belief that
evolution could be explained by these two scientific theories. This led to the
erroneous idea that Darwinism, or neo-Darwinism, are synonyms of biological
evolution. Other evolutionist approaches exist and it is necessary for them to be
deepened and discussed within biologic sciences. In this sense, we would like to
bring to your attention a set of principles and data that could be integrated in a
Symbiogenic Theory of Evolution. This theory must include Darwinist principles,
but does not limit itself to the latter in its attempt to promote and explain the
development, organization and evolution of the biological world in a symbiogenic
sense. However, this approach does not present the cooperative perspective as
the only leitmotif in its explanation of the biologic phenomena. Consequently, the
concept of symbiosis, which we consider as the most valid to understand the
biologic and evolutionary phenomena, is the one that was developed and
presented by Anton de Bary in 1878 and defined as “the common life of different
organisms”3. The latter does not imply a strict compartimentation of interspecific
relationships, thus it should be regarded as a continuous and dynamic process of
different relations, such as mutualism, parasitism and commensalisme. In this
process, the acquisition of new genes through lateral transfer plays an important
role. The same applies to the development of new metabolic capacities acquired
by an organism from other organisms associated to it. The existence of mutual
benefit should, however, not be considered, as the plus or common denominator
of the symbiotic process. As it was adequately referred by Dubos and Kessler, in
1963, during the 1st International Conference on Symbiosis, in London, “the
nutritional effects of symbiosis are not its most interesting manifestation. More
remarkable is the fact that many symbiotic systems produce substances and
structures that neither one of the two components produces when growing
alone”4.
In what way could this approach help us to better understand the origin of life on
Earth or elsewhere? The OparinHaldane ideas constitute the main principles of
the heterotrophic hypothesis of the origin of life and were reinforced by the
successful results of the 1953 Miller-Haldane experiment. The Oparin-Haldane
hypothesis rest on the assumption that the mixture of gases in Earth’s early
atmosphere was much different from today. Large amounts of these gases would
have dissolved in the primitive oceans and would have received energy from
sunlight, lightning, and the Earth’s internal heat. Both authors suggested how this
energy could have caused the simple molecules to combine into more complex
molecules and how the latter could have formed larger and larger combinations.
After several hundred million years, such combinations could have formed the
first living cells, following a Darwinian padron of evolution in which the survival of
the fittest and natural selection were the main driving rules for the appearance of
life on Earth. Even with some modification, these approaches are the principal
theoretical tools that present scientists can use to probe the formation of life in
the astrobiological domain. However, there is a great difference between the
Oparin’s and Haldane’s approaches. It is related to the two fundamental functions
of life – metabolism and replication - . While Oparin gave an evolutionary priority
to metabolism, Haldane gave it to replication, and the choice between these two
alternatives still divides, nowadays, the fields of the theories of origin of life5.

Both these two theories are built on the belief that evolution was a Darwinian
strict process without any cooperative or synergistic approach. However, we
believe that this approach must evolve in a more symbiogenic way, introducing
new concepts that enable us to understand the natural world in a more
cooperative sense and eventually closer to reality. In this sense, the conventional
“survival of the fittest” cannot be applied in that traditional way. A cooperative,
synergistic strategy should be considered as having been the determinant in the
development of the survival of the fittest, especially under extremely adverse
environmental conditions. One good example is the stromatolites, considered as
the first ecological strategy evolved for survival on primitive Earth, not for one
organism but for a community of organisms. This view can also be applied to the
pre-biotic evolution. In 1983, Freeman Dyson presented a hypothesis for the
origin of life using symbiogenic concepts, which is further developed in his book
“Origins of Life” published in 19856. He invoked Lynn Margulis’ ideas on the origin
of eukaryotic cells, proposing that the pre-biotic evolution would have been
accomplished by the independent formation, on one hand, of metabolic systems,
and on the other hand, of autoreplicative molecules. At a specific moment, some
of these molecules would have been synthesized within some of those systems,
first as parasites and then as symbionts, which evolved together. Under this
concept, the primitive nucleic acids, namely RNAs, invaded their metabolic hosts
and used them for their own replication, in a schema summarized “metabolism
first, replication second”7. Although, in these circumstances, the replication of
nucleic acids could be unlikely, it gives an interesting solution to the main
dilemma, how primitive systems could be able to storage information and to
perpetuate themselves, using nucleic acids. However, in terms of biochemical
principles, the replication process seems to be simpler than the metabolism one,
which leads us to the belief that this process could have had the leading role in
this evolutive scenario. But as Marcello Barbieri points out, “it remains to be seen,
however, if the replication paradigm can really account for the processes that led
to the origin of the first cells.”5.

Following the replication paradigm, the formulation of the so called “RNA world”
by Walter Gilbert in 1986 to designate a hypothetical stage in the development of
life in which RNA was the primary information and catalytic molecule, combining
the properties of RNA and proteins, was a natural theoretical step after the
discovery of ribozymes by Thomas Cech and Sidney Altman. The fact that
ribozymes came before protein enzymes does not mean that replication came
before metabolism, although it was generally interpreted that if RNAs could
behave as genes and enzymes, they became the first replicators in the history of
life5. According to this scenario the RNA world should be a world of replicators,
implying that primitive Earth was populated by RNAs showing the capacity to
replicate themselves or to catalyse the replication of other RNAs5. This has not
been proven yet. Furthermore, RNAs are “sophisticated, evolutionarily advanced
molecules”7,which could imply that the latter were not the main leading
molecules responsible for the chemical evolution on primitive Earth. In this sense,
we would like to think that a symbiogenic scenario was responsible for the
development of pre-biotic processes that led to the origin of primitive cells.

3. CHEMICAL BLOCKS OF LIFE AND PRIMORDIAL CELLS

The establishment and development of cellular life needs the presence of the
adequate molecules for the chemical and organic evolution. The nature and origin
of these chemical blocks of life are essential to understand how life had been
formed and how it has evolved. Two main scenarios exist to explain its origins: the
endogenous and exogenous models. The first one includes the theoretical Oparin-
Haldane hypothesis, including the Miller-Urey experiment and the hydrothermal-
systems hypothesis. The second one is associated to extraterrestrial synthesis and
its delivery to Earth by cosmic bodies, such as comets and meteors. The first
protocells were membrane-bounded systems of catalytic and replicating
macromolecules8, similar to the models presented by Oparin and Sidney Fox
(coacervates and microspheres). The formation of these protocellular systems
begins, in our perspective, with the self-assembly of primitive membranes in
aqueous environments creating a barrier and defining the separation between
the outside and inside medium. These membranes could be formed
spontaneously in the prebiotic milieu or even in some cosmic bodies. The
presence of amphiphilic compounds isolated from the Murchison meteorite,
having the ability to self-assembly into membrane vesicules8, could indicate a
possible path on how these primitive systems could be formed and evolve. In
these cases, life in prebiotic environmental conditions will involve the
development of cellular systems of encapsulated replicating/catalytic
macromolecules8.

In his article “The Universal Ancestor”9, Carl Woese presents a genetic model for
the universal ancestor of extant life, pointing out that “the universal ancestor is
not a discrete entity. It is, rather, a diverse community of cells that survives and
evolves as a biological unit”. He named this universal ancestor progenote. We
believe that this theoretical scenario fits correctly into the idea of a cell
community that existed and evolved in the early life stages on Earth. On this
sense, the traditional concept of “primordial cell” is a biological chimera in our
point of view. We suggest there were probably open communities of protocells,
changing and incorporating information among them, as the base supporting
evolution of the early “tree” of life. Ultimately, we consider that primitive reality
to a huge “prebiotic web library”. From this point of view, one important question
must be formulated. Did those protocells evolve from elements present only on
Earth, or did they incorporate alien materials? Even if we still do not have a final
answer, both scenarios should always be presented in any symbiogenic strategy.
Cells, like we have previously described, can be included in a new cellular concept
entitled, “symbiocell”, since survival of the community under such adverse
conditions required a cooperative, synergistic strategy. A “symbiocell” is a
concept based on the principles that the cell or the protocell is organized not only
as a separate biological unit, but as a community of functions acquired by
symbiogenic means and evolved using symbiotic rules. In a sense, evolving and
behavioring like an ecological community or a natural microcosm. The
“symbiocell” will be the material support for the existence and development of
the adequate information flow, energy and metabolites that constitute the web
base of the autonomous and further communal life evolution. Later, these cells
continue to evolve in a symbiogenic way, involving and acquiring specialized
microbial communities which lead to the appearance of the eukaryotic cells,
according to the serial endosymbiotic theory10.

4. FINAL REMARKS
In this paper we have used a new approach to understand the problem of the
origin of life on Earth. According to this point of view, we believe that the
metabolism/replication dilemma is not the main issue to be considered. The main
point will be how evolution took place and worked in such early adverse
environment. To obtain a good answer to this problem, we must consider
different evolutive approaches, other than the traditional Darwinian ones,
introducing new tools to build a symbiogenic scenario of evolution. A cooperative
and a communal synergistic strategy should be considered as having been the
determinant in the development of the “survival of the fittest”, especially under
such extremely adverse environmental conditions. This approach could also be
used to understand the life formation in other locations beyond our planet.

Human evolution
Human evolution is the evolutionary process that led to the emergence of
anatomically modern humans, beginning with the evolutionary history of
primates—in particular genus Homo—and leading to the emergence of Homo
sapiens as a distinct species of the hominid family, the great apes. This process
involved the gradual development of traits such as human bipedalism and
language as well as interbreeding with other hominins, which indicate that
human evolution was not linear but a web.

The study of human evolution involves several scientific disciplines, including

physical anthropology, primatology, archaeology, paleontology, neurobiology,
ethology, linguistics, evolutionary psychology, embryology and genetics.Genetic
studies show that primates diverged from other mammals about 85 million years
ago, in the Late Cretaceous period, and the earliest fossils appear in the
Paleocene, around 55 million years ago.

Within the Hominoidea (apes) superfamily, the Hominidae family diverged from
the Hylobatidae (gibbon) family some 15–20 million years ago; African great apes
(subfamily Homininae) diverged from orangutans (Ponginae) about 14 million
years ago; the Hominini tribe (humans, Australopithecines and other extinct biped
genera, and chimpanzees) parted from the Gorillini tribe (gorillas) between 8–9
million years ago; and, in turn, the subtribes Hominina (humans and biped
ancestors) and Panina (chimpanzees) separated 4–7 million years ago

The earliest documented representative of the genus Homo is Homo habilis,

which evolved around 2.8 million years ago and is arguably the earliest species for
which there is positive evidence of the use of stone tools. The brains of these
early hominins were about the same size as that of a chimpanzee, although it has
been suggested that this was the time in which the human SRGAP2 gene doubled,
producing a more rapid wiring of the frontal cortex. During the next million years
a process of rapid encephalization occurred, and with the arrival of Homo erectus
and Homo ergaster in the fossil record, cranial capacity had doubled to 850
cm3.(Such an increase in human brain size is equivalent to each generation having
125,000 more neurons than their parents.) It is believed that Homo erectus and
Homo ergaster were the first to use fire and complex tools, and were the first of
the hominin line to leave Africa, spreading throughout Africa, Asia, and Europe
between 1.3 to 1.8 million years ago.

According to the recent African origin of modern humans theory, modern humans
evolved in Africa possibly from Homo heidelbergensis, Homo rhodesiensis or
Homo antecessor and migrated out of the continent some 50,000 to 100,000
years ago, gradually replacing local populations of Homo erectus, Denisova
hominins, Homo floresiensis, Homo luzonensis and Homo
neanderthalensis.Archaic Homo sapiens, the forerunner of anatomically modern
humans, evolved in the Middle Paleolithic between 400,000 and 250,000 years
ago.Recent DNA evidence suggests that several haplotypes of Neanderthal origin
are present among all non-African populations, and Neanderthals and other
hominins, such as Denisovans, may have contributed up to 6% of their genome to
present-day humans, suggestive of a limited interbreeding between these
species.The transition to behavioral modernity with the development of symbolic
culture, language, and specialized lithic technology happened around 50,000
years ago, according to some anthropologists] although others point to evidence
that suggests that a gradual change in behavior took place over a longer time
span.

Homo sapiens is the only extant species of its genus, Homo. While some (extinct)
Homo species might have been ancestors of Homo sapiens, many, perhaps most,
were likely "cousins", having speciated away from the ancestral hominin line.
There is yet no consensus as to which of these groups should be considered a
separate species and which should be a subspecies; this may be due to the dearth
of fossils or to the slight differences used to classify species in the genus
Homo.The Sahara pump theory (describing an occasionally passable "wet" Sahara
desert) provides one possible explanation of the early variation in the genus
Homo.
Based on archaeological and paleontological evidence, it has been possible to
infer, to some extent, the ancient dietary practices of various Homo species and
to study the role of diet in physical and behavioral evolution within Homo.

Some anthropologists and archaeologists subscribe to the Toba catastrophe

theory, which posits that the supereruption of Lake Toba on Sumatran island in
Indonesia some 70,000 years ago caused global consequences,killing the majority
of humans and creating a population bottleneck that affected the genetic
inheritance of all humans today. The genetic and archaeological evidence for this
remains in question however.
The first fossils of Homo erectus were discovered by Dutch physician Eugene
Dubois in 1891 on the Indonesian island of Java. He originally named the material
Anthropopithecus erectus (1892–1893, considered at this point as a chimpanzee-
like fossil primate) and Pithecanthropus erectus (1893–1894, changing his mind as
of based on its morphology, which he considered to be intermediate between
that of humans and apes).[173] Years later, in the 20th century, the German
physician and paleoanthropologist Franz Weidenreich (1873–1948) compared in
detail the characters of Dubois' Java Man, then named Pithecanthropus erectus,
with the characters of the Peking Man, then named Sinanthropus pekinensis.
Weidenreich concluded in 1940 that because of their anatomical similarity with
modern humans it was necessary to gather all these specimens of Java and China
in a single species of the genus Homo, the species Homo erectus.Homo erectus
lived from about 1.8 Ma to about 70,000 years ago — which would indicate that
they were probably wiped out by the Toba catastrophe; however, nearby Homo
floresiensis survived it. The early phase of Homo erectus, from 1.8 to 1.25 Ma, is
considered by some to be a separate species, Homo ergaster, or as Homo erectus
ergaster, a subspecies of Homo erectus.

In Africa in the Early Pleistocene, 1.5–1 Ma, some populations of Homo habilis are
thought to have evolved larger brains and to have made more elaborate stone
tools; these differences and others are sufficient for anthropologists to classify
them as a new species, Homo erectus—in Africa.The evolution of locking knees
and the movement of the foramen magnum are thought to be likely drivers of the
larger population changes. This species also may have used fire to cook meat.
Richard Wrangham suggests that the fact that Homo seems to have been ground
dwelling, with reduced intestinal length, smaller dentition, "and swelled our
brains to their current, horrendously fuel-inefficient size" suggest that control of
fire and releasing increased nutritional value through cooking was the key
adaptation that separated Homo from tree-sleeping Australopithecines.