Life on Earth began somewhere between 3.7 and 4.5 billion years ago, after meteorites splashed down and leached essential elements into warm little ponds, say scientists at McMaster University and the Max Planck Institute in Germany. Their calculations suggest that wet and dry cycles bonded basic molecular building blocks in the ponds' nutrient-rich broth into self-replicating RNA molecules that constituted the first genetic code for life on the planet.
The researchers base their conclusion on exhaustive research and calculations drawing in aspects of astrophysics, geology, chemistry, biology and other disciplines. Though the "warm little ponds" concept has been around since Darwin, the researchers have now proven its plausibility through numerous evidence-based calculations.
[...] The spark of life, the authors say, was the creation of RNA polymers: the essential components of nucleotides, delivered by meteorites, reaching sufficient concentrations in pond water and bonding together as water levels fell and rose through cycles of precipitation, evaporation and drainage. The combination of wet and dry conditions was necessary for bonding, the paper says.
Original URL: Did life on Earth start due to meteorites splashing into warm little ponds?
Origin of the RNA world: The fate of nucleobases in warm little ponds (DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1710339114) (DX)
-- submitted from IRC
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Thursday October 05 2017, @04:33PM (1 child)
Insightful. So many researchers seem so very sure of themselves - but they can offer no proofs. Next year, there will be another study to refute this study - but THEY won't offer any proofs either. Meanwhile, you, me, or anyone can sit around and daydream (with or without the benefit of hallucinogenic drugs) and come to our own, equally valid, conclusions.
I lean toward the panspermia hypothesis. Life didn't originate here on earth. We're all alien life forms, that have adapted to conditions on earth. But, I'm not going to beat the idea to death. There's is no proof, so I'm not going to try convincing you that it's true.
And, none of it matters anyway. Knowing one way or the other would make absolutely no difference to any of us.
(Score: 2) by Mykl on Thursday October 05 2017, @10:59PM
OK, let's assume that life began elsewhere and hitchhiked to Earth.
How did that life start? The question doesn't go away by simply offshoring it.
For my money, I care less about which planet the warm pool existed on and more about whether combining the right set of elements under the right set of conditions does actually create life.
You're right though - it doesn't really matter. If this is how life began, the religious can easily say that this was just the mechanism that God worked through (after creating a Universe with the rules that would allow this to happen).