Speaking of the editor and proto organelles, I shared some ideas here:
So I want to add more to this and share them to this thread.
First, I’d like to suggest new resources to add: NADPH/NADH and FADH (so we don’t rely so much on ATP for everything). They aren’t important for survival like ATP is, but they’ll be useful for other proteins that use them (and doesn’t use ATP). These proteins include the ones responsible for carbon fixation for example. Proteins that generate them, for example, are the ones responsible for citric acid cycle. I’m bringing this up because they will come up in what I’m going to write next. (BTW; “[?]” means either I forgot the specific amount or the devs decide the amount for flexibility or because there probably isn’t/shouldn’t)
For the thylakoid, I have an idea. It starts out first as a small membrane-bound organelle, but it can grow the more components you add to it, and you can control where it grows. There is a diminishing returns of course, so you stack these thylakoids and you may even form structures like granum (plur. grana).
Components:
ATP synthase (thylakoid) - generates ATP from proton gradient (1 ATP per 3 H+)
Photosystem II - uses sunlight to split (2)H2O into O2 and 4 protons (4 H+ @ [?]% sunlight) (also produces electrons)(minus [rate])
Cytochrome b6f - uses the energy of electrons to pump protons ([?] H+ and [?] <e- per [?] e-)
Plastocyanin - transports electrons from cytochrome b6f to PSI (increase <e- transport rate to PSI @ [?]/[frequency])
Photosystem I - uses sunlight and electrons from plastocyanin to regenerate NADPH from NADP+ (1 NADPH per 2 e- @ [?]% sunlight)(minus [rate])
Light Harvesting Complex - increases sensitivity to sunlight (additional production rate/work @ [?]% sunlight)(plus [rate])
You can use MPs to upgrade the components’ production rate and there’s a maximum of course.
For aerobic respiration, I don’t think metabolosomes should do that (they use a different metabolic process that isn’t found in mitochondria). Instead you unlock a set of proteins (that allow for aerobic respiration; among others) once you upgrade to double membrane. The more you add these components, the more wrinkles the inner membrane get (bonus visuals!). I don’t know if there should be a diminishing returns to this or not, perhaps a limit instead (because there’s only so much of surface area you can add to the inner membrane before it becomes unreliable.
Components:
ATP synthase (inner membrane) - [same as above]
Cytochrome (there are many different types) - transports electrons from bc1 to AA3, also has other functions (increase e- transport rate to AA3 @ [?]/[frequency])
NADH dehydrogenase (complex I in mitochondria) - pumps protons and generates electrons from NADH (4 H+ and 2 e- per 1 NADH)
Cytochrome bc1 (complex III in mitochondria) - uses the energy of electrons to pump protons ([?] H+ per [?] e-)
Cytochrome AA3 (complex IV in mitochondria) - uses O2 and electrons from Cyt C to pump protons (4 H+ and 2 H2O per 8 e- and 1 O2)
You can use MPs to upgrade the components’ production rate and there’s a maximum of course.
There are other things I can’t go through rn, like the alternative photosynthesis components (i.e. for purple bacteria) and alternative bacterial ETCs. A lot of different prokaryote species use many similar systems in their metabolic pathways; usually only differing from how many different electron donors they use. I’ll edit this further in the (hopefully not so far) future.
Edit: I know it’s been months (sorry), but I just need to make an update. I’ve decided to abandon this post, I’ve been thinking about this and I just felt like there’s something flawed (about this post). I’m not abandoning the idea, though.