Brian Stockman, PhD, and his student team will look into the deep past to uncover clues to how life began on our planet and how it might begin on other worlds.
Brian Stockman, PhD, a professor of chemistry, spent most of his career doing pharmaceutical research but said he鈥檚 always been fascinated by the question of how nonliving molecules became organic and how life began. Now, as the recipient of a prestigious , he鈥檒l have the opportunity to research how life on Earth could have originated and potentially help NASA identify signs of emerging life in our solar system.
Dr. Stockman conceived the project, , while on sabbatical at Rutgers University in 2023, where he became familiar with researchers involved with NASA鈥檚 efforts to develop ideas and definitions for identifying life that may not look much like what we see on Earth today. He began thinking about a shift of focus from his usual line of research to the consideration of how chemical reactions occurring billions of years ago on Earth might have set the stage for life. In particular, he wanted to consider how one of the core requirements of life, the ability to use energy, occurred in ongoing chemical processes as a lead-up to the emergence of primitive organisms.
Moving Molecules
Dr. Stockman and his team are studying how life might have started by focusing on energy, which is released by electrons moving between more and less excited states. Metals like iron could have helped early chemical processes channel electrons, leading to the creation of tiny chains of amino acids called peptides, which may have evolved into more complex molecules necessary for life. They鈥檒l incorporate methodologies developed by recent to explore these questions.
鈥淲e鈥檙e specifically focusing on the aspect of the emergence of life involving energy,鈥� he said. 鈥淲here did the energy come from? Energy is basically moving electrons around. Most of biochemistry is holding onto electrons.鈥�
Dr. Stockman and his team are using AI to sort through vast databases of proteins that exist today to look for likely candidates that they might use as the next step in the project. Modern proteins are built from 20 amino acids, but Dr. Stockman鈥檚 team is focusing on 10 simpler, believed to have been present before life arose. These proteins will be tested to see if they can generate energy without the 10 additional amino acids produced by living organisms today. In that phase, the Adelphi team will build proteins having structures that might be compatible with energy use but include only the 10 amino acids that existed on Earth before the beginnings of life, then conduct tests to see how they function.
鈥淲e鈥檙e trying to omit the use of the 10 biotic amino acids to see if AI can tell us of a sequence that only has 10 prebiotic building blocks that seems to work well,鈥� Dr. Stockman said.
鈥淎 Diverse Group of Thinkers鈥�
When he took his grant application to the National Science Foundation, the reviewers got so excited about the prospect that the project could help scientists better understand the foundations of life that they actually encouraged Dr. Stockman to do even more testing than he originally intended. The grant awarded has allowed him to hire Adelphi and high school students through 2027, with the bulk of the project work occurring during the summer. The involvement of the high school students is in line with NSF goals.
鈥淭here will be at least two high school students per summer recruited onto the team,鈥� Dr. Stockman said. 鈥淲e鈥檙e trying to use this to matriculate students from underrepresented communities interested in STEM into Adelphi.鈥�
The team, including Adelphi students who are chemistry, biology, biochemistry, computer science and math majors, will not only wrestle with an exciting subject, but, in working with AI and producing proteins, they will get practical experience in lab techniques and procedures that can help them launch careers. The fact that the team represents different disciplines brings multiple perspectives to the work.
鈥淚 wanted a diverse group of thinkers,鈥� Dr. Stockman said.
In applying new Nobel Prize-winning techniques including applications of generative AI to advance the PrOBE the project, the team will be undertaking pioneering research that could produce breakthroughs not only about the emergence of life but beyond the core purpose of the project as well, including discoveries that could have a broad range of scientific and commercial uses.
Having enough understanding to identify what NASA calls emerging life is critical to projects such as the which will place a spacecraft in temporary orbit around Jupiter鈥檚 icy moon Europa to scout out the prospects for life and prepare for a second possible mission that would on the surface and test for chemistry related to life. The Adelphi project may help inform NASA in its efforts.