LESLIE E. ORGEL is senior fellow and research professor at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in San Diego, which he joined in 1965. He obtained his Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of Oxford in 1951 and subsequently became a reader in chemistry at the University of Cambridge. While at Cambridge, he contributed to the development of ligandfield theory. The National Aeronautics and ...

The physical origin of life addresses itself to a semantic process on material grounds, in which causation toward contextualization is at work. Physically semantic process of whatever kind is specific in that every material participant is searching and modifying the material context to be fitted in. Fundamental to the physical semantics is the process of measurement proceeding internally among ...

There are diverse theories about the origin of life on Earth. Perhaps it started with an electric spark that generate amino acids and sugars from an atmosphere loaded with water, methane, ammonia, and hydrogen, and over million years, larger and more complex molecules could form. Other possibility is that molecules of life met on clay due to DNA are relatively well preserved in those conditions...

While all organisms on Earth share a common descent, there is no consensus on whether the origin of the ancestral self-replicator was a one-off event or whether it only represented the final survivor of multiple origins. Here, we use the digital evolution system Avida to study the origin of self-replicating computer programs. By using a computational system, we avoid many of the uncertainties i...

The homochirality of biological molecules (the use of only left handed amino acids and only right handed sugars) has long been known to be an important characteristic of life. Current ideas on the origin of life do not explain the origin of homochirality, yet the widely accepted 'RNA world' model cannot work without it. The recent discoveries of chiral asymmetry in the Murchison meteorite, and ...

Iron-sulphur proteins are ancient and drive fundamental processes in cells, notably electron transfer and CO2 fixation. Iron-sulphur minerals with equivalent structures could have played a key role in the origin of life. However, the 'iron-sulphur world' hypothesis has had a mixed reception, with questions raised especially about the feasibility of a pyrites-pulled reverse Krebs cycle. Phylogen...

Why life persists at the edge of chaos is a question at the very heart of evolution. Here we show that molecules taking part in biochemical processes from small molecules to proteins are critical quantum mechanically. Electronic Hamiltonians of biomolecules are tuned exactly to the critical point of the metal-insulator transition separating the Anderson localized insulator phase from the conduc...

Different viewpoints, many with deep philosophical and historical roots, have shaped the scientific study of the origin of life. Some of these argue that primeval life was based on simple anaerobic microorganisms able to use a wide inventory of abiotic organic materials (i.e. a heterotrophic origin), whereas others invoke a more sophisticated organization, one that thrived on simple inorganic m...

It is suggested that life originated in a three-step process referred to as the jigsaw model. RNA, proteins, or similar organic molecules polymerized in a dehydrated carbon-rich environment, on surfaces in a carbonrich environment, or in another environment where polymerization occurs. These polymers subsequently entered an aqueous environment where they folded into compact structures. It is ar...