Origin of life on Earth | CDP Origin of life

The origin of life on Earth poses very exciting challenges. Undoubtedly, life is the result of a complex process that started 4.5 Gy ago, and, perhaps, even earlier, with the formation of the Solar System.

Recent discoveries demonstrates that life appeared very early on Earth, the earliest fossils being dated to 3.3-3.5 Gyr ago, with putatively oldest traces of life 3.7 Gyr ago, indicating that the emergence of life took place in just a few 100 Myr. While many advances have been made in recent years to better identify the crucial steps for the emergence of life, many of them are not yet solved and clearly established facts are still the exception rather than the rule.

Initial conditions

Undoubtedly, life is the result of a long and complex process that started 4.5 Gy ago, and, perhaps, even earlier, with the formation of the Solar System. The inception of life was favored by the crust composition, differing from the solar and primordial nebulae by a significant enhancement in rock-forming elements.

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Mineral origins of the Living

Theories for the origin of life have been traditionally divided into heterotrophic and autotrophic beginnings. The first assumes that the bricks of life were brought to Earth by external sources such as comets or meteorites that "seeded" our planet.

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Primary Life analysis

The earliest fossils (3.3-3.5 Gy ago) have been found in metamorphic "greenstone belts", which have emerged through an Archean « vertical tectonics ». Fossils were found and characterized based on encompassing rock dating coupled to our non-destructive X-ray methods of nano-imaging (synchrotron)

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