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Author Topic: Prebiotic chemistry and origins of life (continued)...  (Read 11120 times)

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Offline blobrana

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Re: Prebiotic chemistry and origins of life (continued)...
« on: December 15, 2004, 05:08:19 PM »
@ Karlos
>> there has been no significant (bio)chemical evolution for a very, very long time.

 Hum,
It seems to me that to have evolution in chemistry, then the carbon-based life forms have to have variation.
However, since there are only a set amount to amino acids then that narrows down diversification.
(The `best` are always used and survive)

I believe that the modern approach to evolution, envisages a contoured `landscape` that dictate the paths of evolution. The landscape being formed by random values such as the type of star we orbit, the gravity and composition of the earth, temperature and chemistry, etc…

Offline blobrana

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Re: Prebiotic chemistry and origins of life (continued)...
« Reply #1 on: December 15, 2004, 11:23:10 PM »
Hum,
I don’t think that Darwinism is really applicable to the pre biotic stages of life.
It probably is another mechanism that stacks up the odds for having more and more complexity to chains of amino acids leading up to something like RNA.

What ever that mechanism is we know that it was probably quite a rapid process due to the signs of life, which shows up relatively soon after the molten earth had cooled down.

Offline blobrana

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Re: Prebiotic chemistry and origins of life (continued)...
« Reply #2 on: December 16, 2004, 05:28:20 PM »
Heres a link to evolutionary landscapePDF:

Or here

That may be key to asking the correct questions.

Offline blobrana

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Re: Prebiotic chemistry and origins of life (continued)...
« Reply #3 on: December 18, 2004, 02:26:16 PM »
Impressive,
Second place is still worth writing about though...(in CV)


Anyway, i noticed this:
"Two years ago, another team showed that polio viruses could assemble themselves from off-the-shelf chemical components mixed in a test-tube.

And several chemists are exploring the kinds of chemical reactions that may have preceded life."

from here...