  Proteinoids (thermal proteins) are produced by heating amino acids to their
melting point and initiation of polymerisation to produce polymeric chains.
Amino acid-like molecules, or proteinoids, can condense at high temperatures to
create aggregation structures called proteinoid microspheres, which have been
reported to exhibit strong electrical oscillations. When the amino acids
L-Glutamic acid (L-Glu) and L-Aspartic acid (L-Asp) were combined with electric
fields of varying frequencies and intensities, electrical activity resulted. We
recorded electrical activity of the proteinoid microspheres' ensembles via a
pair of differential electrodes. This is analogous to extracellular recording
in physiology or EEG in neuroscience but at micro-level. We discovered that the
ensembles produce spikes of electrical potential, an average duration of each
spike is 26 min and average amplitude is 1 mV. The spikes are typically grouped
in trains of two spikes. The electrical activity of the ensembles can be tuned
by external stimulation because ensembles of proteinoid microspheres can
generate and propagate electrical activity when exposed to electric fields.
