Posted on 11/04/2005 5:00:06 AM PST by PatrickHenry
Minerals help molecules thought to have been essential for early life to form.
A team of US scientists may have found the 'primordial womb' in which the first life on Earth was incubated.
Lynda Williams and colleagues at Arizona State University in Tempe have discovered that certain types of clay mineral convert simple carbon-based molecules to complex ones in conditions mimicking those of hot, wet hydrothermal vents (mini-volcanoes on the sea bed). Such complex molecules would have been essential components of the first cell-like systems on Earth.
Having helped such delicate molecules to form, the clays can also protect them from getting broken down in the piping hot water issuing from the vents, the researchers report in the journal Geology [Williams L. B., et al. Geology, 33. 913 - 916 (2005).].
"It's very interesting that the clays preserve them," says James Ferris, a specialist on the chemical origins of life at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York. "It shows that this could be an environment where complex organic molecules can be formed."
Some like it hot
Hydrothermal vents are created when seawater that has seeped through cracks in the seafloor is heated by magma just below the surface. The water streams back out of the rock in a plume that can reach temperatures of around 400 °C.
Vents are a favourite candidate for the site where life first appeared. Their heat provides an energy source; the minerals provide nutrients; and the deep-sea setting would have protected primitive organisms from the destructive meteorite impacts that scoured the planet's surface early in its history.
But researchers have long wondered how, if early life did form in this environment, it escaped being boiled and fried by the harsh conditions.
The Arizona State team has shown that clay minerals commonly found at vents can encase organic molecules, keeping them intact.
Between the sheets
The group simulated the vent environment in the laboratory, immersing various types of clay in pressurized water at 300 °C for several weeks and looking at the fate of a simple organic compound, methanol, in this stew. They chose methanol because their earlier work had shown that the compound could be formed in a vent environment from simple gases such as carbon dioxide and hydrogen.
Clays generally consist of sheets made of aluminium, silicon and oxygen atoms, which are stacked on top of one another. In some of these materials, such as the clays saponite and montmorillonite, there is room for other atoms and molecules to slip between the layers.
Spouting soup
The researchers found that the methanol in their artificial vent system was converted to various large organic molecules over six weeks or so, so long as the clay's layers were spaced widely enough to hold the compounds.
"The clay provides a safe haven for the organic molecules, essentially like a 'primordial womb'," the team reports. Eventually, changes in the clay's mineral structure caused by heat, pressure and time may cause the sheets to close up and expel the molecules inside. But they think that some of these could spout out from the clay into less hostile environments than the hottest part of the vent, creating an organic soup in which life might arise.
These findings add weight to the idea that clays were the key to the origin of life. Previous research has shown that clays act as catalysts for the formation of polymer molecules such as the precursors of proteins and DNA. They can also encourage lipid molecules to arrange themselves into cell-like compartments called vesicles.
I took this to mean that he had personal observations of red shift.
"After his ordination in 1923, Lemaitre studied math and science at Cambridge University, where one of his professors, Arthur Eddington, was the director of the observatory.
For his research at Cambridge, Lemaitre reviewed the general theory of relativity. As with Einstein’s calculations ten years earlier, Lemaitre’s calculations showed that the universe had to be either shrinking or expanding. But while Einstein imagined an unknown force — a cosmological constant — which kept the world stable, Lemaitre decided that the universe was expanding. He came to this conclusion after observing the reddish glow, known as a red shift, surrounding objects outside of our galaxy." http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/science/sc0022.
Such bashings in science tend to be short lived, particularly if the new idea is a mathematically correct extrapolation of an existing theory.
Should the EvoGuy said "Most" do? ;^)
"Sea floor spreading needs a FLOOR to spread and according to the Pangea theory, there was NO floor until it broke apart into our continents. "
Oh, my. Pangaea probably existed about 225 mya. Do you suppose that the Earth just sat there for the first 4 billion years? Current thinking has several supercontinents, splitting up and reforming. Most likely, the Earth was even more active earlier in its history.
You do need to think about these things before writing.
The oceans didn't have a floor back then? What kept the water from pouring out the bottom?
Realtor to a southern house-hunter: "This house has no flaws."
House-hunter's response: "Then what d'yall stand on?"
:-)
To see what the Earth most likely looked like before Pangaea ever formed, and what it is likely to look like some 250 million years in the future, go here:
http://www.scotese.com/earth.htm
Learning is good.
Alrighty, if you fellas are gonna start discussing sciatica or prostate glands or whatever, I'm outta here...
See now private interpretation seems to be saying to you something different than what that passage says to me. You seem to be suggesting that Paul is using "we" as in "we scripture writers". I don't see that, he is talking about letters he has written to the Corinthians not scripture in general.
"Alrighty, if you fellas are gonna start discussing sciatica or prostate glands or whatever, I'm outta here..."
Nossir. None of that organ recital business around here. Now, just let me get my cane and toddle off...
"That may still be truly random, only that the underlying distribution isn't uniform. Having a uniform distribution isn't all that important as the distribution may be changed by looking at things differently.
And if it happens in the same areas across related species?
(Don't encourage him, he's been waiting for a probability post just so he could use that one for a while)
Elitists!
"Elitists!"
Darned straight! We didn't get to this advanced age without meaning to take advantage of it. You younguns will just have to wait to enjoy all the fun benefits of hitting 60...oh, wait...what were those benefits again?
What?
(Coyoteman pinged as a courtesy since I mentioned his name, too.)
Thanks but I am giving the creation stories a rest. I think I made the point I intended, and I don't want to overdo it.
Now, if I could interest you in a nice story about radiocarbon dating, just let me know!
As Bob Hope in the classic western Son of Paleface said to a couple of special effect buzzards/penguins ... "You're making it ridiculous!"
Even more significant than Liston?
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