preprints.org > doi: 10.3390/sci1020035

Preprint Article Version 1 Preserved in Portico This version is not peer-reviewed

Version 1 : Received: 25 June 2019 / Approved: 28 June 2019 / Online: 4 July 2019 (00:00:00 CEST)
Version 2 : Received: 25 June 2019 / Approved: 28 June 2019 / Online: 6 October 2019 (00:00:00 CEST)

It is proposed that the primary living cells (“probionts”) cannot emerge of organic substance simply by continuous chemical complication of prebiotic macromolecules and microsystems. The complication must be accompanied by the radical thermodynamic transformation (“jump”) of prebiotic microsystems that resulted in the acquired ability to extract free energy from the environment and export entropy. This transformation is called “the thermodynamic inversion” The inversion may occur by means of the efficient (intensified) response of the microsystems on the oscillations of physic-chemical parameters in hydrothermal environment. In this case the surplus available free energy within a microsystem, when combined with the informational modality, facilitates its conversion into a new microsystem—a living probiont. It is shown the schematic representation of an oscillating prebiotic microsystem that is transforming into a living probiont. A new kind of laboratory and computational experiments on prebiotic chemistry under oscillating conditions is offered to verify the inversion concept.

origin of life; prebiotic system; living cell; oscillation; organic molecule; experiment; hydrothermal system