Mathematics – Logic
Scientific paper
Dec 1999
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1999oleb...29..555g&link_type=abstract
Origins of Life and Evolution of the Biosphere, v. 29, Issue 6, p. 555-561 (1999).
Mathematics
Logic
7
Scientific paper
If phosphorus played a role in the origin of life, some means of concentrating micromolar levels of phosphate (derived from the calcium phosphate mineral apatite), must first have been available. Here we show that simulated (mini)lightning discharges in model prebiotic atmospheres, including only minimally reducing ones, reduce orthophosphates, including apatite, to produce substantial yields of phosphite. Electrical discharges associated with volcanic eruptions could have provided a particularly suitable environment for this process. Production of relatively soluble and reactive phosphite salts could have supplied a pathway by which the first phosphorus atoms were incorporated into (pre)biological systems.
de Graaf R. M.
Glindemann D.
Schwartz Alan W.
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