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The origin and evolution of life have long been subjects of scientific inquiry, particularly regarding the mechanisms that facilitate the transition from simple chemical systems to complex biological entities. This paper demonstrates that symbiosis, through a series of chemical unions between self-reproducing particles, plays a crucial role in this evolutionary process by enabling the irreversible increase in complexity necessary for the development of prokaryotic cells from simpler auto-catalytic systems.
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The paper uses chemical kinetic arguments and illustrations by computer modelling to discuss the origin and evolution of life. Complex self-reproducing chemical systems cannot arise spontaneously, whereas simple auto-catalytic systems can, especially in an irradiated aqueous medium. Self-reproducing chemical particles of any complexity, in an appropriate environment, have a self-regulating property which permits long-term survival. However, loss of materials from the environment can lead to continuing decay which is circumvented by physical union between different kinds of self-reproducing particles. The increasing complexity produced by such unions (symbioses) is irreversible so that the chemical system evolves. It is suggested that evolution by successive symbioses brough about the change from simple, spontaneously arising, auto-catalytic particles to complex prokaryotic cells.
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King, G.A.M. Symbiosis and the origin of life. Origins Life Evol Biosphere 8, 39–53 (1977). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00930938
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00930938