Genetic Takeover and the Mineral Origins of Life

Genetic Takeover and the Mineral Origins of Life PDF Author: A. G. Cairns-Smith
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780521346825
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 477

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Book Description
Paper reprint of the 1982 edition.

Genetic Takeover and the Mineral Origins of Life

Genetic Takeover and the Mineral Origins of Life PDF Author: A. G. Cairns-Smith
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780521346825
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 477

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Book Description
Paper reprint of the 1982 edition.

Genetic Takeover and the Mineral Origins of Life

Genetic Takeover and the Mineral Origins of Life PDF Author: Alexander Graham Cairns-Smith
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780521233125
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 477

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Book Description
Three key ideas replace the notion that a primordial soup of organic molecules was essential in this explanation of how life on Earth evolved.

Clay Minerals and the Origin of Life

Clay Minerals and the Origin of Life PDF Author: Alexander Graham Cairns-Smith
Publisher: CUP Archive
ISBN: 9780521324083
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 216

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Book Description
This volume is the edited proceedings of a conference seeking to clarify the possible role of clays in the origin of life on Earth. At the heart of the problem of the origin of life lie fundamental questions such as: What kind of properties is a model of a primitive living system required to exhibit and what would its most plausible chemical and molecular makeup be? Answers to these questions have traditionally been sought in terms of properties that are held to be common to all contemporary organisms. However, there are a number of different ideas both on the nature and on the evolutionary priority of 'common vital properties', notably those based on protoplasmic, biochemical and genetic theories of life. This is therefore the first area for consideration in this volume and the contributors then examine to what extent the properties of clay match those required by the substance which acted as the template for life.

The Limits of Organic Life in Planetary Systems

The Limits of Organic Life in Planetary Systems PDF Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309179564
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 116

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Book Description
The search for life in the solar system and beyond has to date been governed by a model based on what we know about life on Earth (terran life). Most of NASA's mission planning is focused on locations where liquid water is possible and emphasizes searches for structures that resemble cells in terran organisms. It is possible, however, that life exists that is based on chemical reactions that do not involve carbon compounds, that occurs in solvents other than water, or that involves oxidation-reduction reactions without oxygen gas. To assist NASA incorporate this possibility in its efforts to search for life, the NRC was asked to carry out a study to evaluate whether nonstandard biochemistry might support life in solar system and conceivable extrasolar environments, and to define areas to guide research in this area. This book presents an exploration of a limited set of hypothetical chemistries of life, a review of current knowledge concerning key questions or hypotheses about nonterran life, and suggestions for future research.

Origins of Life

Origins of Life PDF Author: Geoffrey Zubay
Publisher: Elsevier
ISBN: 0080497616
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 585

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Book Description
Origins of Life on the Earth and in the Cosmos, Second Edition, suggests answers to the age-old questions of how life arose in the universe and how it might arise elsewhere. This thorough revision of a very successful text describes key events in the evolution of living systems, starting with the creation of an environment suitable for the origins of life. Whereas one may never be able to reconstruct the precise pathway that led to the origin of life on earth, one can certainly make some plausible reconstructions of it. Such discussions have greatly expanded our understanding of the principles of chemical evolution and how they compare and contrast with the principles of biological evolution. The text is strong on biochemistry and its recent applications to origins' research. - Provides an excellent review of basic biochemistry an evolution - Written in a clear, concise style for scientists, students, and readers interested in a scientific inquiry into the origins of life - Written by an authority in the field, and brought fully up-to-date in light of new research - Pulls together valuable information not found in a single source - Organized and presented in a manner conductive for use in a college course - Heavily illustrated to make difficult concepts concrete

Origins of Life: The Primal Self-Organization

Origins of Life: The Primal Self-Organization PDF Author: Richard Egel
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 3642216250
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 363

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Book Description
If theoretical physicists can seriously entertain canonical “standard models” even for the big-bang generation of the entire universe, why cannot life scientists reach a consensus on how life has emerged and settled on this planet? Scientists are hindered by conceptual gaps between bottom-up inferences (from early Earth geological conditions) and top-down extrapolations (from modern life forms to common ancestral states). This book challenges several widely held assumptions and argues for alternative approaches instead. Primal syntheses (literally or figuratively speaking) are called for in at least five major areas. (1) The first RNA-like molecules may have been selected by solar light as being exceptionally photostable. (2) Photosynthetically active minerals and reduced phosphorus compounds could have efficiently coupled the persistent natural energy flows to the primordial metabolism. (3) Stochastic, uncoded peptides may have kick-started an ever-tightening co-evolution of proteins and nucleic acids. (4) The living fossils from the primeval RNA World thrive within modern cells. (5) From the inherently complex protocellular associations preceding the consolidation of integral genomes, eukaryotic cell organization may have evolved more naturally than simple prokaryote-like life forms. – If this book can motivate dedicated researchers to further explore the alternative mechanisms presented, it will have served its purpose well.

The Molecular Origins of Life

The Molecular Origins of Life PDF Author: André Brack
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521564755
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 432

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Book Description
This 199 book reviews discoveries in astronomy, paleontology, biology and chemistry to help us to understand the likely origin of life on Earth.

Prebiotic Chemistry and the Origin of Life

Prebiotic Chemistry and the Origin of Life PDF Author: Anna Neubeck
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030810399
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 296

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Book Description
This book presents an overview of current views on the origin of life and its earliest evolution. Each chapter describes key processes, environments and transition on the long road from geochemistry and astrochemistry to biochemistry and finally to the ancestors of today ́s organisms. This book combines the bottom-up and the top-down approaches to life including the origin of key chemical and structural features of living cells and the nature of abiotic factors that shaped these features in primordial environments. The book provides an overview of the topic as well as its state of the art for graduate students and newcomers to the field. It also serves as a reference for researchers in origins of life on Earth and beyond.

Origins of Life

Origins of Life PDF Author: Freeman Dyson
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1139425765
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 114

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Book Description
How did life on earth originate? Did replication or metabolism come first in the history of life? In this book, Freeman Dyson examines these questions and discusses the two main theories that try to explain how naturally occurring chemicals could organize themselves into living creatures. The majority view is that life began with replicating molecules, the precursors of modern genes. The minority belief is that random populations of molecules evolved metabolic activities before exact replication existed. Dyson analyzes both of these theories with reference to recent important discoveries by geologists and chemists. His main aim is to stimulate experiments that could help to decide which theory is correct. This second edition covers the enormous advances that have been made in biology and geology in the past and the impact they have had on our ideas about how life began. It is a clearly-written, fascinating book that will appeal to anyone interested in the origins of life.

Marine Hydrothermal Systems and the Origin of Life

Marine Hydrothermal Systems and the Origin of Life PDF Author: N.G. Holm
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 9401127417
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 248

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Book Description
Research of the origins of life in connection with a marine environment started at the end of the seventies, when the `black smokers' in the Pacific were discovered and the Red Sea deep hydrothermal brines were found to be a fruitful environment for abiotic synthesis of life precursors. For a while this research was categorised under the heading `chemistry', but in less than a decade the topic became fully integrated into the science of 'oceanography'. The Scientific Committee on Oceanographic Research (SCOR) initiated Working Group 91: Chemical Evolution and Origin of Life in Marine Hydrothermal Systems'. This volume contains the final report of this working group.