THE CHEMICAL FORMATION PROBLEM.
There are some hurdles to the origin of life in a "primordial soup" which involve specifically chemistry. The links on this page take you to pages that deal specifically with problems involving chemistry.
THE RNA HURDLE.
RNA is a simpler form of DNA. Scientists favour RNA as the first “bio” molecule. However, there are insurmountable difficulties in the formation of RNA in a primordial soup.
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PROTEIN FORMATION.
Proteins could not have formed in a primordial soup.
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THE CLUTTER PROBLEM.
Impurities would prevent “bio” molecules from forming in the primordial soup.
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THE MISSING MONOMERS HURDLE.
A “bio” molecule is built from smaller chemical components (or “monomers”). Many necessary monomers cannot even be created in the laboratory, let alone in a primordial soup.
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THE DNA/PROTEIN HURDLE.
Proteins alone cannot replicate themselves, and DNA needs proteins to help it replicate itself. This means that DNA and proteins would have to appear SIMULTANEOUSLY in the primordial soup in order to “kick start” life. This simultaneous appearance is vanishingly improbable.
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THE ISOMER HURDLE.
A single organic chemical molecule can come in different shapes (or “isomers”). If the “wrong” isomers connected up, a “bio” molecule could not form. The chances of a length of RNA or protein forming with all the “correct” isomers is vanishingly small.
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THE HYDROLYSIS HURDLE.
RNA and proteins are destroyed by water, and therefore could not have formed in a primordial soup.
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THE MULTI-STAGE HURDLE.
To create “bio” molecules, many separate chemical steps are required, and in the correct sequence. This cannot happen in a primordial soup.
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THE RIBOSE HURDLE.
Ribose is a type of sugar that is essential for the formation of RNA or DNA. Ribose cannot form in a primordial soup.
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THE PHOSPHORUS HURDLE.
RNA and DNA contain phosphorus, which cannot be available in a primordial soup.
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THE CHIRALITY HURDLE.
Organic molecules are either “right handed” or “left handed”. However, all biological proteins are “right handed”. A mixture of right and left handed will not do. In a primordial soup left and right handed molecules combine indiscriminately, and so cannot form “bio” molecules.
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THE ERROR CATASTROPHE HURDLE. If RNA can be (with very great difficulty) made to replicate itself in the laboratory, errors in the replication process accumulate until the “progeny” can no longer replicate.
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THE REPLICATION HURDLE.
The replication of RNA molecules in a primordial soup is beset with insurmountable difficulties.
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THE ULTRA-VIOLET HURDLE.
Ultra-violet light on the prebiotic Earth would destroy “bio” molecules.
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THE CELL MEMBRANE HURDLE.
Even if life could have formed in the primordial soup, it would have soon been destroyed by ambient chemicals, unless there was a cell membrane to protect it. There was no cell membrane in the primordial soup.
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THE PHOTOSYNTHESIS HURDLE.
If life could form in the primordial soup, it would require nutrition, that could only be provided by the extremely complex process of photosynthesis (which would be unavailable in a primordial soup).
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MINERAL ORIGIN.
There was a theory that life originated from minerals. According to scientific opinion, this idea is a “non-starter”.
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THE ATMOSPHERIC HURDLE.
Earth’s early atmosphere did not contain the ingredients to produce the molecules of life.
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