Since ancient times, there are many theories to explain the origin of life. Such as western creationism, China's Pangu creationism, etc. But it was not until the19th century that with the publication of Darwin's On the Origin of Species, great changes took place in biological science, and at the same time it brought a glimmer of light to reveal the eternal mystery of the origin of life, which is the modern chemical evolution theory. The chemical evolution theory of the origin of life was first proved by an American scholar Miller in 1953. What should the events about the origin of life described by Miller look like? That is, in the early days, the earth contained a large number of reducing primitive atmospheres, such as methane, ammonia, water, hydrogen and primitive oceans. When lightning struck the earth in the early days, these gases polymerized into various amino acids, which may be partially concentrated at normal temperature and pressure, and then further evolved into protein, other polysaccharides and polymer lipids, which may be pregnant and developed into life in a certain period of time, which is described by Miller.
Life on earth may have been born 3.8 billion to 4 billion years ago, but we should be soberly aware that we still have a long scientific journey to solve the eternal mystery of the origin of life. The evolution from inorganic matter to organic matter, from organic compounds to organic life is also very accidental. It is not such an environment. Only with such conditions can life be produced. Someone once said that these inorganic substances are like a garbage dump, which contains everything, such as plastics, plastic bottles, iron, scrap metal and oil. Life, a single cell, is like a beautiful Mercedes-Benz. After a typhoon, these wastes were assembled into a Mercedes-Benz. Therefore, we can imagine the process of the origin of life is very, very difficult. Therefore, maybe we are the only paradise for life on this blue planet, so please protect our earth and cherish life on it. We can't expect the second origin of life on earth.
The first mystery about the origin of life is the time of life and the time of origin. In the Western Middle Ages, people believed in the story of God creating man in the Bible. 1650, an Irish archbishop calculated the exact time of God's creation according to the description in the Bible, and another priest even calculated the creation time more accurately to 9: 00 a.m. on June 23, 4004 BC. In other words, the origin of life is 6000 years ago, which is certainly not true, but what is it? That's a really scientific answer. How does science answer the time of the origin of life? That is to say, to answer with fossils, fossils are preserved in rocks. We know that after the death of living things, their remains are preserved in rocks under appropriate conditions. We call it a fossil. Rock formations formed in geological history, like a chronicle, are buried deep in these rocks, and older biological fossils are preserved at the bottom of the rock formations.
So far, we have found that the oldest biological fossils are rocks from western Australia, about 3.5 billion years ago. These fossils are similar to modern cyanobacteria. They are some primitive life, invisible to the naked eye. Its size is only a few microns to tens of microns, so we can say that the origin of life is not later than 3.5 billion years. At the same time, we know that the earth was formed about 4.6 billion years ago. With these two data, we can see the age of the origin of life, which can be roughly defined between 4.6 billion and 3.5 billion years. Today, with the development of science, geologists believe that in the early days of the earth's formation, the earth was hit by a large number of asteroids and meteorites, which was not suitable for life. It was not so much that there was life on the earth at that time, but that it was destroying life, so the origin of life on the earth was not earlier than 4 billion years. In addition, carbon was found in rocks in Greenland 3.85 billion years ago. As we know, there are two kinds of carbon, one is inorganic carbon and the other is organic carbon. In addition, this kind of carbon can be divided into heavy carbon and light carbon, so we can infer the source of these carbons according to the ratio of light carbon to heavy carbon in this kind of carbon. According to the isotope analysis of carbon, scientists speculate that it is organic carbon and comes from organisms. That is to say, in this way, we have greatly shortened the time of the origin of life, that is, between 4 billion and 3.8 billion years, from the origin of life on earth to the present, it is an endless evolutionary history of life.
Since the 1940s, nearly 100 kinds of organic molecules, such as formaldehyde and amino acids, have been detected by means of astrophysics. Two of these celestial bodies can be related to life on the earth, and may bring life or organic molecules to the earth. One is a comet and the other is a meteorite. We know that these two celestial bodies contain a large number of organic molecules. For example, we call some comets dirty snowballs. They contain not only solid water, but also organic compounds such as amino acids, iron, ethanol, purine and pyrimidine, and life may be produced on comets and brought to the earth. Or when comets and meteorites hit the earth, these organic molecules undergo a series of synthesis to produce new life. Of course, this embryology also has different ideas. It has two fatal weaknesses. One is whether life can migrate in the universe for a long time. Can you survive? We know that the distance between celestial bodies is calculated in light years, and the communication between celestial bodies may take thousands of years, from one planet to another. In this vacuum, exposed to this large amount of cosmic rays, can living life continue to sprout after thousands of years? This is the biggest problem, the second process from inorganic molecules to organic compounds. This process, for example, we saw the formation of small organic molecules on comets, and it can also be formed on earth, which is beyond doubt.
From 65438 to 0859, with the publication of Darwin's On the Origin of Species, great changes have taken place in biological science, and at the same time, it has brought a ray of light to reveal the eternal mystery of the origin of life, which is the modern chemical evolution theory. The chemical evolution theory of the origin of life was first confirmed by American scholar Miller in 1953. Since you said that the temperature of the earth was relatively high in the early days, reducing gases and water were everywhere, I put these gases and water in a bottle to see if life or organic compounds could be produced. 1953, Miller put ammonia, hydrogen, water and carbon monoxide in a sealed bottle, inserted metal rods at both ends in the bottle, and then turned on the power. Through this lightning action, a large number of amino acids were indeed produced in a few days. That is to say, on the earth, under lightning and at room temperature, it can also become inorganic molecules and synthesize organic molecules. We know that your amino acid is the most important substance that constitutes protein, and it can be said that it is the most important substance that constitutes the origin of life. So, what should Miller's description of the origin of life look like? That is, in the early days, the earth contained a large number of reducing primitive atmospheres, such as methane, ammonia, water, hydrogen and primitive oceans. When lightning struck the earth in the early days, these gases were polymerized into a variety of amino acids, which may be partially concentrated at normal temperature and pressure, and then further evolved into polysaccharides such as protein and protein, as well as polymer lipids, which may be pregnant and developed into life at a certain time.