Bacteria, evolution, atmospheric oxygen

Another group of archaebacteria is methanogens, which produce methane from carbon dioxide emd hydrogen. These bacteria are killed by oxygen and therefore occur only in anaerobic environment. In the earliest stage of evolution, when there was no oxygen atmosphere (more than 2 billion years ago), these bacteria could have existed everywhere. Their cell walls are periodic open structures ("mesh" phases) of self-assembled S-proteins, discussed in section 4.13. 

The influence of plant sterols on the phase properties of phospholipid bilayers has been studied by differential scanning calorimetry and X-ray diffraction [206]. It is interesting that the phase transition of dipalmitoylglycerophosphocholine was eliminated by plant sterols at a concentration of about 33 mole%, as found for cholesterol in animal cell membranes. However, less effective modulation of lipid bilayer permeability by plant sterols as compared with cholesterol has been reported. The molecular evolution of biomembranes has received some consideration [207-209]. In his speculation on the evolution of sterols, Bloch [207] has suggested that in the prebiotic atmosphere chemical evolution of the sterol pathway if it did indeed occur, must have stopped at the stage of squalene because of lack of molecular oxygen, an obligatory electron acceptor in the biosynthetic pathway of sterols . Thus, cholesterol is absent from anaerobic bacteria (procaryotes). 

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