[DLS] Dimitar Sasselov (Harvard)

Reconstructing Planetary Environments for the Origin of Biological Homochirality

What is the best approach to constrain the geochemical scenarios for the origins of life on Earth? We advocate an iterative approach between advances in Early Earth geochemical models and constraints from prebiotic chemistry. As an illustration I will discuss the requirement from prebiotic chemistry that life’s molecular building blocks must be homochiral and their specific polymers stereochemistry emerged early. The few plausible solutions to the homochirality problem constrain the initial geochemical conditions in very different ways, and this allows interesting constraints.

EAPS Department Lecture Series —

Weekly talks aimed to bring together the entire EAPS community, given by leading thinkers in the areas of geology, geophysics, geobiology, geochemistry, atmospheric science, oceanography, climatology, and planetary science. Runs concurrently with class 12.S501. 

Contact: eapsinfo@mit.edu