I was wondering about the phosphates used as linkages for... well everything important.

We call Earth life carbon based. Sure organic molecules use carbon.

But they seem to be pretty useless without the phosphate links as far as the nitrogenous bases go.

Can anyone shed some light on where life gets these phosphates, are they synthesized, are they ingested or both and any of the chemical pathways they follow?

All of by web searches have come up lacking.

Plants absorb phosphates from the soil.

things that eat plants get phosphates from plants.

Things that eat (things that eat plants) get phosphates from (things that eat plants).

And so on.

In fact, most things that eat plants (and so on) get rather more phosphate than they need and the excess is excreted in the urine.

 

The phosphate in dead things is returned to the soil by bacteria etc.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phosphorus_cycle

Somewhat of a tangent, but "Why Nature Chose Phosphate" an article by Frank Westheimer, an important bioorganic chemist, about 1987 is worth one's time. "Why nature chose phosphate to modify proteins" by Tony Hunter from 2013 is good, also.

Edited October 15, 201510 yr by BabcockHall

Thanks John for your link.

And thanks again to you Babcock. I just finished reading Hunter's paper and a review of Westheimer's.

I think I know now more than I wanted too.

But really- the phosphate group seems to be just as fundamental to our replicating molecules as anything else and it seems to always be glossed over.

I do not think it is glossed over. You will hear pretty much everywhere that it is one of the essential elements of life. You may have heard of CHONP referring to the major elements required for life.

Charon, thanks again

 

Are there enzymes that attach the oxygens to the phosphorus or are all the phosphates ingested?

The oxygn-phosphorus bond is so strong that it is relatively rare to see phosphorus bonded to anything else in nature.

There are a few examples like this one

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fosfomycin

where phosphorus is bonded directly to a carbon.

John, thank you for that highly interesting molecule.

Are there a whole bunch of triangular "ringed" cyclo molecules out there or are they somewhat rare?

Triangular rings are a bit uncommon in chemistry, but sometimes very useful

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_strain

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epoxide