News tagged with prebiotic world

Study proves plausibility of new pathway to life's chemical building blocks

For decades, chemists considered a chemical pathway known as the formose reaction the only route for producing sugars essential for life to begin, but more recent research has called into question the plausibility of such ...

Chemistry / Biochemistry

created Jan 31, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (6) | comments 6 | with audio podcast

Scientists discover new clue to the chemical origins of life

Organic chemists at the University of York have made a significant advance towards establishing the origin of the carbohydrates (sugars) that form the building blocks of life.

Chemistry / Biochemistry

created Jan 24, 2012 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (26) | comments 284 | with audio podcast




Search results for prebiotic world


Meteorites reveal another way to make life's components

(PhysOrg.com) -- Creating some of life's building blocks in space may be a bit like making a sandwich – you can make them cold or hot, according to new NASA research. This evidence that there is more ...

Biology / Cell & Microbiology

created Mar 09, 2012 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (11) | comments 8 | with audio podcast

A salt-free primordial soup?

Most scientists who study the origin of life assume that it occurred in the ocean. But a minority view is that ions in seawater may interfere with prebiotic chemistry, making a freshwater environment more ...

Chemistry / Biochemistry

created Jan 19, 2012 | popularity 3.4 / 5 (5) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Simpler times: Did an earlier genetic molecule predate DNA and RNA?

(PhysOrg.com) -- In the chemistry of the living world, a pair of nucleic acids—DNA and RNA—reign supreme. As carrier molecules of the genetic code, they provide all organisms with a mechanism for ...

Chemistry / Biochemistry

created Jan 09, 2012 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (28) | comments 117 | with audio podcast

Gum arabic potential cure for Sudanese ills

Since he was 14, Al-Amin has tapped gum arabic, the resin of an acacia tree that thrives in Sudan's conflict states -- "manna" from heaven for some, a key ingredient in Coca-Cola for others.

Space & Earth / Environment

created Nov 25, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (3) | comments 0

Physicists uncover new data on adenine, a crucial building block of life

Early Earth's atmosphere provided little shielding for ultraviolet light from space, so many prebiotic molecules, bombarded by it and light of other wavelengths, had a hard time surviving at all. But some molecules became ...

Physics / Condensed Matter

created Aug 18, 2011 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (7) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

RNA reactor could have served as a precursor of life

(PhysOrg.com) -- Nobody knows quite how life originated on Earth, but most scientists agree that living cells did not abruptly appear from nonliving cells in a single step. Instead, there were probably a series ...

Physics / General Physics

created Jul 11, 2011 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (27) | comments 103 | with audio podcast feature

Comets may have brought life to Earth: new study

(PhysOrg.com) -- Life on Earth as we know it really could be from out of this world. New research from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory scientists shows that comets that crashed into Earth millions of ...

Chemistry / Biochemistry

created Sep 13, 2010 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (21) | comments 13 | with audio podcast

New bacteria strain points the way toward 'super sourdough' bread

What better venue than San Francisco -- sourdough capital of the world -- to unveil a new natural sourdough ingredient that could replace conventional additives in a variety of other breads, while making them ...

Biology / Cell & Microbiology

created Mar 22, 2010 | popularity 5 / 5 (7) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

New technique helps search for another Earth (Update)

The quest to find another world that sustains life has been boosted by a technique that should let less expensive ground-based telescopes join the search, a study said on Wednesday.

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Feb 03, 2010 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (23) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Fibre may keep asthma, diabetes at bay, study finds

Insoluble dietary fibre, or roughage, not only keeps you regular, say Australian scientists, it also plays a vital role in the immune system, keeping certain diseases at bay.

Medicine & Health / Health

created Oct 28, 2009 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (8) | comments 1


List of search results for prebiotic world