Zubarev, Dmitry Yu.Rappoport, DmitrijAspuru-Guzik, Alan2015-03-022015Zubarev, Dmitry Yu, Dmitrij Rappoport, and Alán Aspuru-Guzik. 2015. “Uncertainty of Prebiotic Scenarios: The Case of the Non-Enzymatic Reverse Tricarboxylic Acid Cycle.” Scientific Reports 5 (1): 8009. doi:10.1038/srep08009. http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep08009.2045-2322http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:14065407We consider the hypothesis of the primordial nature of the non-enzymatic reverse tricarboxylic acid (rTCA) cycle and describe a modeling approach to quantify the uncertainty of this hypothesis due to the combinatorial aspect of the constituent chemical transformations. Our results suggest that a) rTCA cycle belongs to a degenerate optimum of auto-catalytic cycles, and b) the set of targets for investigations of the origin of the common metabolic core should be significantly extended.en-USJournal Article2015-03-0210.1038/srep08009