Abstract
Achievement of a self-reproducing giant vesicle (GV) consisting of a synthesized cationic membrane molecule, its cationic bolaamphiphilic precursor, and an acidic amphiphilic catalyst, and self-replication of an informational molecule (DNA) in a non-self-reproducing GV through a polymerase chain reaction promoted us to link the self-replication of DNA in a GV and self-reproduction of the GV chemically. We found that an addition of the membrane precursor to a dispersion of GVs with amplified DNA caused a series of rapid growth-and-division processes of GVs made of phospholipids containing the cationic membrane molecule and the catalyst. It is suspected that the adhesion of some of the amplified DNA to an inner surface of the outer vesicular membrane assists the formation of the membrane molecule from its precursor. Since the amplified DNA was partitioned to the newly formed GVs, this vesicular system can be regarded as a chemically constructed primitive protocell.
