[News] Did Life Begin In Space? New Evidence From Comets

[Moontanman]

Did Life Begin In Space? New Evidence From Comets

ScienceDaily (Aug. 14, 2007) — Recent probes inside comets show it is overwhelmingly likely that life began in space, according to a new paper by Cardiff University scientists.

 

Did Life Begin In Space? New Evidence From Comets

[HydrogenBond]

Life as we know it on earth will not work properly with any other continuous phase, but water. Life is 70-90% water and will not work in the dehydrated state, which implies water has to be part of the dynamics. To begin life from scratch, we also need simple molecules like methane, ammonia, CO2, NOx, etc., which all have lower melting and boiling points than water. If the water remains liquid we can get an extraction that will strip these compounds out of gas mixtures. If the water becomes ice, the efficiency will fall real low.

 

This creates a practical problem for comets. Even if the inside can become liquid, its surface is low extracting ice that constantly forms a barrier for extraction as it grows. It is in contact with space which is cold. One has to hope all these gases things will somehow be trapped between the layers of ice. This is not too far fetched, so let us assume this can occur.

 

Say the earth began with the average asteroid concentration of these trapped gases. As these asteroids collide to form the earth, we get bulk heating, to release all this trapped gas. The early earth had a hot surface but a colder upper atmosphere. There should have been liquid water in the middle. This layer will extract and concentrate these needed gases into the liquid water. Now we have the concentrated feedstock for life.

 

The surface water is only a tiny fraction of the mass of all the asteroids that formed the earth, but will end up with a higher share of the small molecules due to chemical extraction and solubility in liquid water. The below link shows solubility of molecules, even methane and ethane as function of water temperature. Most are more soluble at lower temperature, which means if the warm surface misses the gas, the cooler water higher up is an even more powerful extractor and will get the traces.

 

Solubility of Gases in Water

 

What is good about this, we don't have to depend on any one asteroid to do it all. Whatever any asteroid can bring to the party is welcome. We will put it all in the liquid water and make a concentrated soup. Water is special because it will help make life possible even while it is collecting the asteroid gases. Water can make lightning reign when the oceans were hot. The ancient earth was one big storm, trapping and electrocuting gases, and then extracting products like animo acids to add advanced things to the big pot of soup.