Can Prebiotic Chemistry Help Us Understand the Formation of Life?

At Analytica USA in Columbus, Ohio, Christian Mayer, a professor of physical chemistry at the University of Duisburg-Essen in Germany, delivered a talk titled, “Spontaneous Structural Development of a Peptide-vesicle System Towards Possible Protocells.”

In this talk, Mayer described laboratory experiments simulating conditions at 1 km depth in the Earth’s crust using pressure cycling. Under these conditions, simple prebiotic molecules spontaneously form peptides and vesicles, which then interact as vesicles incorporate peptides into their membranes (1). Over time, the system undergoes selection for stability, driving increasing molecular order, peptide complexity, and functionality, ultimately pointing toward the potential formation of functional protocells (1).

LCGC International: Your team used pressure cycling to simulate conditions at a depth of 1 km in the Earth’s crust. What advantages does this approach offer compared to other experimental models for studying prebiotic chemistry?

Mayer: I think all these models that are currently discussed have their justification. I believe when we deal with the question about the origin of life, we will never have the possibility to really prove what started life on our planet. But I think this isn't even the most important question. The most important question is: how could life start? What processes could lead to the formation of life, and look at the principles behind that, and I think one of the principles here is periodicity itself.

Periodicity does two things. First, it defines the sequence of generations. For example, periodicity in the evolution of our planet is given by the lifespan of individual organisms. Due to the lifespan, we always have this period of life and death, and this periodicity forms subsequent generations, which then can undergo certain improvements, which then can be selected, step by step, and undergo an evolution process. I think this periodicity is very important, and we call it time rhythm, defining periods of time where such a process can occur, and maybe more importantly, periodicity causes a driving force. Since periodicity always changes the point of an equilibrium, it always keeps the system from reaching this equilibrium.

If I periodically change temperature or pressure, then the system is always trying to go back into the equilibrium state, which basically drives processes. It is a driving force. It forms energy, which keeps processes going on. Systems can never go into the equilibrium state, so they never stop working on an improvement process. That’s why I believe no really good explanation for the prebiotic process can be done without some periodicity. It could be the periodicity of wet and dry cycling. This is one possibility. It could also be temperature periodicity, but in our case, it was a pressure periodicity, and I think we could show that pressure periodicity has about the same effect.

This interview segment with Mayer is part of our conversation with him. You can view all our coverage of Analytica USA here.

Reference

1. Analytica USA, Speakers: Christian Mayer. Analytica USA. Available at: https://aus2025.mapyourshow.com/8_0/sessions/session-details.cfm?scheduleid=68 (accessed 2025-09-24).