A study led by Richard Zare from Stanford University uncovers a previously unknown electrochemical process involving micro-lightning in tiny water droplets that could have generated vital pre-life chemicals on early Earth. This phenomenon was found to produce life’s building blocks, including glycine and uracil, when simulated in a primordial atmosphere. Zare emphasizes this discovery is a new avenue for exploring life’s origins, although not necessarily the only one. This research ties back to historical theories by Oparin and Haldane about life's emergence via chemical evolution in a 'primordial soup.'
When triggered in a mixture of gases made to replicate the atmosphere on early Earth, these micro-lightnings produced chemical compounds used by present-day life, like glycine, uracil, and urea.
Zare's team demonstrated the existence of micro-lightning, very small electricity discharges that occur between tiny droplets of water spray.
I'm not saying it's the only way this could happen—I wasn't there. But it's a new plausible mechanism that gives us building blocks of life.
Scientific research into the beginnings of life on Earth started in the 1920s with Aleksander Oparin and J.B.S. Haldane, scientists who proposed that life on Earth could have arisen through a process of gradual chemical evolution.
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