Primeval soup

Shapiro published a critical analysis of the availability of the nucleobase cytosine on the primeval Earth in the highly-regarded Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (Shapiro, 1999). Some biogeneticists still believe that all the substances necessary for the synthesis of a nucleic acid were available in the much-cited (but hypothetical) primeval soup . Shapiro directs these optimists to the following problems ... 

Thus, the estimates for the rates of the prebiotic synthesis of biomolecules also need a drastic downward correction the hypothetical primeval soup then becomes much thinner ... 

The prebiotic primeval soup, i.e., the oft-cited mixture of organic molecules in the primordial ocean, or in ponds which could have arisen in many ways, e.g., in the atmosphere or the hydrosphere the substances concerned could also have been delivered from outer space. 

Lazcano, an evolutionary biologist, and Miller, an experienced prebiotic chemist, believe that the most important bottlenecks in the biogenesis process leading from the primeval soup to the RNA world, and thence to cyanobacteria, are the following ... 

The molecules that formed the first most primitive form of life had to self-assemble in the "primeval soup". Besides the obvious requirement of selfreproduction, there must have been an encapsulating membrane, separating inside from outside. The cubosome (a dispersed bicontinuous cubic phase, cf. Chapter 5) provides a number of remarkable properties that make it a candidate as an organisational assembly for the earliest forms of life. 

Hydrocarbon chains attached to polar heads would certainly have been formed frequently in the "primeval soup". The possibility that these self-assembling molecules would form a cubic structure is only a question of molecular dimensions, evident from the discussions in Chapter 5. Further, catalytic properties of a surface with high (negative) Gaussian curvature are likely, as... 

Wills, C. Bada, J. The Spark of Life. Darwin and the Primeval Soup Perseus Publishing Cambridge, MA, 2000 p 54ff. 

Kotter s first principle for businesses seeking transformational change is to establish a sense of urgency, and that is equally applicable in public policy. Acceptance of the urgency of a problem is at least as important as a consensus that the problem exists. Lindblom and Woodhouse insightfully wrote Policy making resembles a primeval soup—action occurs fitfully as problems wax and wane and pressures come and go. Let us consider some examples. 

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