Author(s)

E. Angeles-Camacho^1,2, J. Cruz-Castañeda^1,3, A. Meléndez^1,3, M. Colín-García⁴, K. Cervantes de la Cruz^1,5, S. Ramos-Bernal¹, A. Negrón-Mendoza¹, G. Garza-Ramos⁶, P. Rodríguez-Zamora⁷, C. Camargo-Raya¹, A. Heredia^1*

¹Instituto de Ciencias Nucleares, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City, México.
²Facultad de Química, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Ciudad Universitaria, Mexico City, México.
³Programa de Maestría y Doctorado en Ciencias Químicas, UNAM. Cd. Universitaria, Mexico City, México.
⁴Instituto de Geología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City, México.
⁵Departamento de Física, Coordinación de Ciencias de la Tierra, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City, México.
⁶Departamento de Bioquímica, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City, México.
⁷Instituto de Física-UNAM, Circuito de la Investigación Científica, Ciudad Universitaria, Mexico City, México.

Glycine crystallizes into three different polymorphs called α, β and γ under standard physicochemical conditions. They have different features depending on their structural variations. The possible interaction of glycine with magnetic minerals in meteorites and comets or in the ancient Earth, paves the way to study the self-assembly and molecular behavior under irradiation and magnetic conditions. The magnetic field might induce the formation of a specific polymorph of glycine. To gain insight on the consequences of gamma irradiation with a gradient of static magnetic fields (0.06 T, 0.3 T, 0.42 T and 0.6 T) on the self-assembly of single macroscopic glycine crystals, we gamma irradiated the powdered amino acid and then assembled single crystals from water solutions. The preliminary results showed a stable formation of fluid inclusions in the single crystals and no straightforward effect on the self-assem- bly process after glycine gamma irradiation and interaction with static magnetic fields. The α glycine polymorph single crystals formed at 55° from the magnetic longitudinal axis and seemed to be enhanced by gamma radiation. The γ-glycine single crystals presented L and D circular dichroism signals, whereas the irradiated samples presented no circular dichroism bands. Com- puter simulations suggest different catalytic properties from α and γ glycine crystals.

Glycine Polymorphs, Fluid Inclusions, Gamma Irradiation, Chemical Evolution, FT-IR, Circular Dichroism, Chiral Crystals

Angeles-Camacho, E. , Cruz-Castañeda, J. , Meléndez, A. , Colín-García, M. , Cruz, K. , Ramos-Bernal, S. , Negrón-Mendoza, A. , Garza-Ramos, G. , Rodríguez-Zamora, P. , Camargo-Raya, C. and Heredia, A. (2020) Potential Prebiotic Relevance of Glycine Single Crystals Enclosing Fluid Inclusions: An Experimental and Computer Simulation with Static Magnetic Fields. Advances in Biological Chemistry, 10, 140-156. doi: 10.4236/abc.2020.105011.