Transition Metal Catalysts Could Be Key To Origin of Life

An anonymous reader writes "One of the big, unsolved problems in explaining how life arose on Earth is a chicken-and-egg paradox: How could the basic biochemicals — such as amino acids and nucleotides — have arisen before the biological catalysts (proteins or ribozymes) existed to carry out their formation? In a paper appearing in the current issue of The Biological Bulletin, scientists propose that a third type of catalyst could have jumpstarted metabolism and life itself, deep in hydrothermal ocean vents."

Comments

Ah Mercury

[Ukab the Great]

Sweetest of the transition metals.

Re:Ah Mercury

[Quiet_Desperation]

It's great with fish.

Re:ok but how does this explain

[roman_mir]

you wouldn't start with citric acid and some simple metal, like iron or copper, you'd have to use something more serious. I imagine AsO(OH)3 (arsenic acid) mixed in some proportion with Strontium and Tin. I think that's how you get Beck.