Were large soda lakes the cradle of life?

Along with nitrogen and carbon, phosphorus is an essential element for life on Earth. It is a central component of molecules such as DNA and RNA, which serve to transmit and store genetic information, and ATP (adenosine triphosphate), which cells need to produce energy. Phosphorus may also have played a key role in the origin of life. Certain conditions are needed to trigger the start of the biochemical processes that precede life. One of these is the presence of sufficient phosphorus. Its availability regulates the growth and activities of organisms. Unlike nitrogen or carbon, however, phosphorus is relatively rare at Earth's surface – which was the case in the era before life existed as well as today. It is precisely because phosphorus is rare and so difficult to obtain, yet subject to high demand by living organisms, that scientists have long wondered how life could have arisen at all. To answer this question, they conducted experiments in the laboratory. These showed that prebio ... Read full article.