Preprint Article Version 1 Preserved in Portico This version is not peer-reviewed

Fatty Acid Vesicles as Hard UV-C Shields for Early Life

Version 1 : Received: 31 December 2022 / Approved: 3 January 2023 / Online: 3 January 2023 (07:34:19 CET)

A peer-reviewed article of this Preprint also exists.

Lechuga, I.; Michaelian, K. Fatty Acid Vesicles as Hard UV-C Shields for Early Life. Foundations 2023, 3, 99-114. Lechuga, I.; Michaelian, K. Fatty Acid Vesicles as Hard UV-C Shields for Early Life. Foundations 2023, 3, 99-114.

Abstract

Theories on life’s origin generally acknowledge the advantage of a semi-permeable vesicle (protocell) for enhancing the chemical reaction-diffusion processes involved in abiogenesis. However, more and more evidence indicates that the origin of life concerned the photo-chemical dissipative structuring of the fundamental molecules under UV-C light. In this paper, we analyze the Mie UV scattering properties of such a vesicle made from long chain fatty acids. We find that the vesicle could have provided early life with a shield from the faint, but dangerous, hard UV-C ionizing light (180-210 nm) that probably bathed Earth’s surface from before the origin of life and until perhaps 1,500 million years after, until the formation of a protective ozone layer as a result of the evolution of oxygenic photosynthesis.

Keywords

ultraviolet shield; protocell; fatty acid vesicles; origin of life; dissipative structuring; prebiotic chemistry; abiogenesis; non-equilibrium thermodynamics; thermodynamic dissipation theory; Mie scattering.

Subject

Chemistry and Materials Science, Organic Chemistry

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