'Genesis': A takeover from field-responsive matter?

TL;DR

This paper explores the potential role of magnetic fields in early life formation, examining how soft matter assemblies could achieve order within geochemical and mineral-based scenarios of life's origins.

Contribution

It introduces the idea that magnetic fields could influence soft matter assemblies, linking prebiotic information transfer and metabolic processes in early Earth conditions.

Findings

Magnetic fields may promote order in colloidal assemblies.

Soft matter could have played a role in early biochemical processes.

Magnetic influence might bridge informational and metabolic aspects of origin theories.

Abstract

Cairns-Smith (2008) has argued for a pre-Darwinian era, with a simpler basis for life's functioning via primitive "crystal genes" (information transfer, kinetic control on metabolic reactions). At the other extreme, guided by the structural similarity of clusters in early-evolved enzymes to iron-sulphide minerals like greigite, the hydrothermal mound scenario of Russell and coworkers (1994) presents how non-equilibrium forces rooted in geochemistry could be extrapolated to understand the metabolic functioning of living systems. The informational vs metabolic aspects of life in these respective scenarios can be linked together via a framboid-based theory of Sawlowicz (2000), as these assemblies typically form in colloidal environments. In this background, we consider the ramifications of a magnetic rock field on the mound scenario, asking if soft matter assemblies are compatible with a coherent order.