by Hugh Coon (Compiled by)
Abiogenesis, or informally the origin of life, is the natural process by which life arises from non-living matter, such as simple organic compounds. The transition from non-living to living entities was not a single event, but a gradual process of increasing complexity.
Researchers study abiogenesis through a combination of molecular biology, paleontology, astrobiology and biochemistry, and aim to determine how pre-life chemical reactions gave rise to life. The study of abiogenesis can be geophysical, chemical, or biological, with more recent approaches attempting a synthesis of all three, as life arose under conditions that are strikingly different from those on Earth today. Life functions through the specialized chemistry of carbon and water and builds largely upon four key families of chemicals: lipids (fatty cell walls), carbohydrates (sugars, cellulose), amino acids (protein metabolism), and nucleic acids (self-replicating DNA and RNA). Any successful theory of abiogenesis must explain the origins and interactions of these classes of molecules. Many approaches to abiogenesis investigate how self-replicating molecules, or their components, came into existence. Researchers generally think that current life on Earth descends from an RNA world, although RNA-based life may not have been the first life to have existed.
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