Is the Chemical Origin of Life (Abiogenesis) a Realistic Scenario?
by Rich Deem

Let us look at the origin of life. There are only two possibilities for the existence of life:

  1. Spontaneous assembly of life from chemicals
  2. There is a Creator who designed biological systems

If you deny the existence of a Creator, scientific studies demonstrate that you must believe each of the following things about the origin of life:

Scientific Facts

Solution

Homochirality somehow arose in the sugars and amino acids of prebiotic soups, although there is no mechanism by which this can occur (1) and is, in fact, prohibited by the second law of thermodynamics (law of entropy). (2) reject the second law of thermodynamics
In the absence of enzymes, there is no chemical reaction that produces the sugar ribose (1), the "backbone" of RNA and DNA. "science of the gaps"
Chemical reactions in prebiotic soups produce other sugars that prevent RNA and DNA replication (1). discard chemistry data

"science of the gaps"

Pyrimidine nucleosides (cytosine and uracil) do not form under prebiotic conditions and only purine (adenine and guanine) nucleosides are found in carbonaceous meteorites (1) (i.e., pyrimidine nucleosides don't form in outer space either). discard chemistry data

"science of the gaps"

Even if a method for formation of pyrimidine nucleosides could be found, the combination of nucleosides with phosphate under prebiotic conditions produces not only nucleotides, but other products which interfere with RNA polymerization and replication (1). discard chemistry data

"science of the gaps"

Purine and pyrimidine nucleotides (nucleosides combined with phosphate groups) do not form under prebiotic conditions (3). discard chemistry data

"science of the gaps"

Neither RNA nor DNA can be synthesized in the absence of enzymes. In theory, an RNA replicase could exist and code for its own replication. The first synthesized RNA replicase was four times longer than any RNA that could form spontaneously (4). In addition, it was able to replicate only 16 based pairs at most, so it couldn't even replicate itself (5). "science of the gaps"
Enzymes cannot be synthesized in the absence of RNA and ribosomes. "science of the gaps"
Nucleosides and amino acids cannot form in the presence of oxygen, which is now known to have been present on the earth for at least four billion years (6), although life arose at least ~3.5 billion years ago (7). discard geological data

discard chemistry data

Adenine synthesis requires unreasonable HCN concentrations. Adenine deaminates with a half-life of 80 years (at 37°C, pH 7). Therefore, adenine would never accumulate in any kind of "prebiotic soup." The adenine-uracil interaction is weak and nonspecific, and, therefore, would never be expected to function in any specific recognition scheme under the chaotic conditions of a "prebiotic soup." (8) discard chemistry data
Cytosine has never been found in any meteorites nor is it produced in electric spark discharge experiments using simulated "early earth atmosphere." All possible intermediates suffer severe problems (9). Cytosine deaminates with an estimated half-life of 340 years, so would not be expected to accumulate over time. Ultraviolet light on the early earth would quickly convert cytosine to its photohydrate and cyclobutane photodimers (which rapidly deaminate) (10). discard geological data

discard chemistry data

Mixture of amino acids the Murchison meteorite show that there are many classes of prebiotic substances that would disrupt the necessary structural regularity of any RNA-like replicator (11). Metabolic replicators suffer from a lack of an ability to evolve, since they do not mutate (12). discard chemistry data
The most common abiogenesis theories claim that life arose at hydrothermal vents in the ocean. However, recent studies show that polymerization of the molecules necessary for cell membrane assembly cannot occur in salt water (13). Other studies show that the early oceans were at least twice as salty as they are now (14) Life arose in freshwater ponds (even though the earth had very little land mass), using some unknown mechanism.

Comparison of the dates of meteor impacts on the moon, Mercury, and Mars indicate that at least 30 catastrophic meteor impacts must have occurred on the earth from 3.8 to 3.5 billion years ago (15). These impacts were of such large size that the energy released would have vaporized the entirety of the earth's oceans (16), destroying all life.

Life spontaneously arose by chance at least 30 separate times, each within a period of ~10 million years
Complex bacterial life (oxygenic photosynthesis) had appeared by 3.7 billion years ago (17), leaving virtually no time for prebiotics to have evolved into the first life forms. discard evidence

New theories, such as assembly of biomolecules on mineral surfaces, are constantly being proposed to attempt to get around the problems associated with the spontaneous origin of life. However, even if you put purified chemicals together (which can't be synthesized prebiotically), you can get polymers only up to 50 mer (obviously not enough for life) (4). Therefore, none of these theories has been able to get around the fundamental chemical problems required for life to have begun on the Earth. Some quotes from evolutionists are cited below:

"It's a very long leap from [mineral] surface chemistry to a living cell." Norman Pace (evolutionary biologist, University of California, Berkeley). (18)

"On theoretical grounds, however, it [mineral clay synthesis] seems implausible. Structural irregularities in clay that were complicated enough to set the stage for the emergence of RNA probably would not be amenable to accurate self-replication." (Leslie Orgel)

'There is now overwhelmingly strong evidence, both statistical and paleontological, that life could not have been started on Earth by a series of random chemical reactions.... There simply was not enough time... to get life going." Niles Eldridge (paleontologist at the American Museum of Natural History). (19)

"There is no agreement on the extent to which metabolism could develop independently of a genetic material. In my opinion, there is no basis in known chemistry for the belief that long sequences of reactions can organize spontaneously -- and every reason to believe that they cannot. The problem of achieving sufficient specificity, whether in aqueous solution or on the surface of a mineral, is so severe that the chance of closing a cycle of reactions as complex as the reverse citric acid cycle, for example, is negligible." Leslie Orgel, 1998 (The Salk Institute for Biological Studies). (20)

Prebiotic chemistry would produce a wealth of biomolecules from non living precursors. But the wealth soon became overwhelming, with the "prebiotic soups" having the chemical complexity of asphalt (useful, perhaps, for paving roads but not particularly promising as a wellspring for life). Classical prebiotic chemistry not only failed to constrain the contents of the prebiotic soup, but also raised a new paradox: How could life (or any organized chemical process) emerge from such a mess? Searches of quadrillions of randomly generated RNA sequences have failed to yield a spontaneous RNA replicator. Steven A. Benner, 1999 (professor of Chemistry at the University of Florida). (21)

Even origin of life researchers are now admitting that getting the basic building blocks for an RNA world is virtually impossible:

G. F. Joyce and L. E. Orgel lead us into the RNA world with a description of the difficulties in achieving the direct synthesis of nucleosides and nucleotides from prebiotic precursors and conclude that the de novo appearance of oligonucleotides on primitive Earth amounts to a "near miracle" W. Keller, 1999 (22).

Researchers are now examining alternative, simpler possible genetic molecules, such as pyranosyl RNAs (pRNAs) that pair up in double helices. However, it seems unlikely that these pRNAs could have been a source of genetic material in early life forms. Pairs of complementary pRNAs form double helices that are structurally very different from those formed by DNA and RNA. According to Leslie Orgel:

"Consequently, pRNAs and RNAs are not able to form duplexes with each other, which would preclude exchange of information between these two molecules, suggesting that pRNAs are unlikely to have been the genetic material that preceded RNA." Leslie Orgel, 2000 (23)

Recently, researchers have synthesized threose-based nucleic acid (TNA) as potential precursors of RNA and DNA (since it is obvious that RNA and DNA could not form spontaneously on primitive earth). Researchers have found that complementary TNA's form double helices among themselves and even with complementary RNAs and DNAs (24). How could a primitive organism that used TNA as its genetic material switch to RNA? There are two potential mechanisms, both of which suffer major, almost certainly fatal, problems. In one mechanism, a TNA-based primitive organism would have synthesized RNA's for a purpose other than replication, such as a means to inhibit TNA synthesis in a competing organism. Under such a scenario, RNA replication would have evolved independently of TNA replication and ultimately took over as the means by which cells reproduce themselves. However, since the two genetic systems never interacted no useful genetic information would have been transferred from TNA to RNA. It is unclear how the original TNA replication system could have been turned off, or the more important problem of how a complete RNA genetic system could have evolved in the absence of natural selection. In the alternative mechanism, RNA bases were at first substituted randomly a few at a time in TNA sequences until the proportion of RNA components increased over time from almost zero to 100%. The information present originally in the TNA sequence was, at least in part, preserved in the final RNA sequence. However, this theory suffers the major drawback that the introduction of a substantial number of RNA bases at random would almost certainly destroy the catalytic function of any particular TNA sequence (a fatal "mutation") in addition to probably preventing replication of TNA, rendering evolved TNA sequences useless.

As can be seen from the above table and information, the atheist's position is becoming more extreme and less reasonable as more knowledge is gained through scientific studies. Atheists are becoming desperate and are now offering $1 million for an explanation that "corresponds to empirical biochemical and thermodynamic reality, and be published in a well-respected, peer-reviewed science journal(s)." In contrast, the revelation of creation from the Bible is being confirmed with the advancement of science.



Related Materials Top of page

Origins of Life: Biblical and Evolutionary Models Face OffOrigins of Life: Biblical and Evolutionary Models Face Off by Fazale Rana and Hugh Ross. Probably the single most potent scientific argument against atheism is the problem with a naturalistic origin of life. This very problem led me to become a deist as a biology major at USC in the early 1970's. The problems for atheists have gotten no better since that time. In fact, the last 30+ years of research have turned up even more problems than those that existed when I first studied the theories. Fuz Rana (a biochemist) and Hugh Ross (an astrophysist) have teamed up to write the definitive up-to-date analysis of the origin of life. The book examines the origins of life from the perspectives of chemistry, biochemistry, astronomy, and the Bible. A biblical creation model is presented along side the naturalistic models to help the reader decide which one fits the data better. This is an excellent book to give to your unbelieving friends, since it presents a testable creation model that is clearly superior to any naturalistic model.


References Top of page

  1. Orgel, L. 1994. The origin of life on earth. Scientific American. 271 (4) p. 81. (Dr. Orgel is an atheist who has been working on origins of life research for over 30 years.)
  2. This argument has nothing to do with the closed/open system question. The 2nd law of thermodynamics states that heat flows from hot bodies to cold bodies. This law also affects the formation of enantiomers in chemical reactions capable of producing stereoisomers. Since the formation of both left- and right-handed enantiomers requires the exact same amount of energy, both enantiomers are produced in identical amounts. Any deviation from this result is highly unlikely (much less likely than the scenario of starting your car on a hot California day and having freeze over while running).
    Some researchers have cited the possibility of differential synthesis of one enantiomer over another in the presence of circularly polarized light. There are a couple problems with this theory. First, there is no source of this kind of light in the vicinity of our solar system. Second, the demonstration of circularly polarized light was found only in the infrared region of the spectrum. Light must be of much more energetic wavelengths (ultraviolet). Third, if stereoisomers were formed, the energy of the light would break them down within a short period of time.
  3. Orgel, L. 1994. The origin of life on earth. Scientific American. 271 (4) p. 82.
  4. 1997. MEETING BRIEFS: Primordial Soup Researchers Gather at Watering Hole. Science 277: 1034.
  5. Robertson, M.P. and W.G. Scott. 2007 The Structural Basis of Ribozyme-Catalyzed RNA Assembly. Science 315: 1549.
  6. Bortman, H. 2001. Life Under Bombardment from the NASA Astrobiology Insititute. - Alternating layers of oxidized iron in the so-called banded iron formation from Akilia Island in West Greenland demonstrates that free oxygen has been present on earth longer than 3.85 billion years.
    Dimroth, E. and M. Kimberley. 1976. Precambrian atmospheric oxygen: Evidence in the sedimentary distributions of carbon, sulfur, uranium, and iron. Can. J. Earth Sci., 13:1161-1185.
    Carver, J. H. 1981. Prebiotic atmospheric oxygen levels. Nature 292: 136-138.
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    M. T. Rosing. 1999. 13C-Depleted Carbon Microparticles in >3700-Ma Sea-Floor Sedimentary Rocks from West Greenland. Science 283, 674.
  8. Shapiro R. 1995. The prebiotic role of adenine: a critical analysis. Orig. Life Evol. Biosph. 25: 83-98.
  9. Cytosine intermediates suffer the following problems:
    1. Synthesis based upon cyanoacetylene requires the presence of large amounts of methane and nitrogen, however, it is unlikely that significant amounts of methane were present at the time life originated.
    2. Synthesis based upon cyanate is problematical, since it requires concentrations in excess of 1 M (molar). When concentrations of 0.1 M (still unrealistically high) are used, no cytosine is produced.
    3. Synthesis based upon cyanoacetaldehyde and urea suffers from the problem of deamination of the cytosine in the presence of high concenrations of urea (low concentrations produce no cytosine). In addition, cyanoacetaldehyde is reactive with a number of prebiotic chemicals, so would never attain reasonable concentrations for the reaction to occur. Even without the presence of other chemicals, cyanoacetaldehyde has a half-life of only 31 years in water.
  10. Shapiro, R. 1999. Prebiotic cytosine synthesis: A critical analysis and implications for the origin of life. Proc. Natl.Acad. Sci. USA 96: 4396-4401.
  11. Shapiro, R. 2000. A replicator was not involved in the origin of life. IUBMB Life 49: 173-176.
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    Knauth, L.P. 2002. Early Oceans: Cradles of Life or Death Traps? Astrobiology Science Conference 2002, April 7-11, NASA Ames Research Center. p. 9.
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    "A few of these impactors were probably 500 kilometers in diameter--big enough to create a superheated atmosphere of vaporized rock that would in turn have vaporized the oceans for 2700 years and sterilized even the subsurface, say Sleep and Zahnle."
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Last Modified June 12, 2007