Phospholipids are the protective layer of modern cells, but it is challenging for the formation of phospholipids that require a simple abiotic synthesis before the advent of primitive cells. Here, we reported the abiotic synthesis for lysophosphatidic acids (LPAs) with prebiotically plausible reactants in aqueous microdroplets under ambient conditions. The LPAs formation is carried out by fusing two microdroplets streams: one contains glycerol and pyrophosphate in water and the other one contains fatty acids in acetonitrile. Compared with the bulk solution, LPAs were generated in microdroplets without the addition of catalyst and heating. Conditions of reactant concentrations and microdroplet size varied and suggested that LPAs formation occurred near or at the microdroplet surface. The LPAs formation also showed chemoselective toward on chain-length of fatty acids. Finally, the formation of LPAs underwent two-step reactions with glycerol phosphorylation eliminating one water molecule followed by esterification with fatty acids. These results also implicated that pyrophosphate functioned as both catalysts and precursors in prebiotic LPAs synthesis. The approach using fusion aqueous microdroplets has desirable features in studying the substance exchange and interaction in atmosphere.

磷脂是现代细胞的保护层，但在原始细胞出现之前需要简单的非生物合成的磷脂的形成具有挑战性。在这里，我们报道了溶血磷脂酸 (LPA) 在环境条件下在含水微滴中与益生元似是而非的反应物的非生物合成。LPAs 的形成是通过融合两种微滴流来实现的：一种是在水中含有甘油和焦磷酸盐，另一种是在乙腈中含有脂肪酸。与本体溶液相比，LPAs 在不添加催化剂和加热的情况下以微滴形式生成。反应物浓度和微滴大小的条件各不相同，表明 LPA 的形成发生在微滴表面附近或附近。LPAs 的形成也显示出对脂肪酸链长的化学选择性。最后，LPA 的形成经历了两步反应：甘油磷酸化消除一个水分子，然后与脂肪酸发生酯化反应。这些结果还暗示焦磷酸盐在益生元 LPA 合成中既充当催化剂又充当前体。使用融合水微滴的方法在研究大气中的物质交换和相互作用方面具有理想的特征。