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About this episode

Before the first living organisms were brought into being, molecules were already moving and changing. Many energy sources, including light and heat from the sun, were available to provide the energy needed to drive chemical reactions. Mechanical energy, which describes the energy of motion, was also readily available before life’s emergence. Dr Helen Greenwood Hansma from the University of California in Santa Barbara explores how mechanical energy could have driven the processes that gave rise to early life.

Original Article Reference

This is a summary of the paper ‘Mechanical Energy before Chemical Energy at the Origins of Life?’, in Sci. doi.org/10.3390/sci2040088 & doi.org/10.1016/j.bpj.2022.08.032

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