For the young planet, solar radiation was both life-giving and harmful. Biochemists seem to have figured out how nature deals with this dilemma and cooked up a nutritious soup in the atmosphere. Establishing a complete and at the same time subtle, conflict-free scenario of the spontaneous emergence of life on Earth is the holy grail of earth science. In general, there is an understanding that under the influence of natural processes there should be a gradual complication of molecules with their assembly into increasingly complex structures.
The result was a groundbreaking moment in which such a massive molecular structure emerged that not only existed but also worked. And he acts knowingly. As you know, it is RNA and even more complex DNA. Molecules programmed to form their own kind. Scientists are sure that electromagnetic radiation – starlight – cannot help in this matter. The sun’s ultraviolet light apparently triggered chemical reactions in Earth’s atmosphere that created and accumulated complex organic molecules known as the “building blocks of life.”
But there is a problem. The same solar radiation was supposed to split water in the atmosphere, and the released oxygen had a destructive effect: it reacted with methane, depriving it of the opportunity to use it for the production of new organic matter. Until now, it was unclear to what extent these two contradictory processes worked.
Recently, researchers from Japan modeled the course of the first chemical interactions on Earth and understood why the creative process triumphs over destruction. In the article Astrobiology The authors said that the calculations point to a protective mechanism operating in the ancient atmosphere: Hydrocarbons and other organic molecules formed in it restricted the spread of ultraviolet radiation, “screening” it. As a result, fewer and fewer water molecules broke apart, so less free oxygen oxidized atmospheric methane.
Cosmochemists thus explained that acetylene, amino acids and other biomolecule precursors settled and accumulated on the planet’s surface, eventually forming a layer hundreds of meters thick. Scientists concluded that this became the “nutritious soup” in which life was eventually “cooked.”
Source: Port Altele
