# Non-equilibrium odds for the emergence of life

## TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that non-equilibrium conditions significantly increase the likelihood of forming complex biological molecules, suggesting that life's building blocks could emerge more readily in such environments.

## Contribution

It introduces an average non-equilibrium model showing how deviations from thermodynamic equilibrium enhance the formation of amino acids and peptides, regardless of specific driving mechanisms.

## Key findings

- Heavy amino acids concentrations boosted by 10,000 times in non-equilibrium.
- Peptide chain lengths increase by hundreds of orders of magnitude.
- Non-equilibrium environments facilitate overcoming barriers to life's molecular formation.

## Abstract

Large and complex molecules are building blocks for life. We compute probabilities for their formation from an average non-equilibrium model. As the distance from thermodynamic equilibrium is increased in this model, so too are the chances for forming molecules that would be prohibitively rare in thermodynamic equilibrium. This effect is explored in two settings: the synthesis of heavy amino acids, and their polymerization into peptides. In the extreme non-equilibrium limit, concentrations of the heaviest amino acids can be boosted by a factor of 10,000. Concentrations of the longest peptide chains can be increased by hundreds of orders of magnitude. Since all details of the non-equilibrium driving are averaged out, these findings indicate that, independent of the details of the driving, the mere fact that pre-biotic environments were not in thermodynamic equilibrium may help cross the barriers to the formation of life.