From Early Earth to Enceladus – Mineral Electrochemistry Could Drive Organic Synthesis

At some point in Earth’s history, chemistry transitioned from abiotic organic synthesis—the building of more complicated organic molecules from smaller ones by nonbiological means—to biochemistry.

Hydrothermal settings are compelling sites for the origins of this transition because they are natural chemical reactors. In this non-equilibrium setting; hot, reduced fluids continuously mix with cold, oxidized seawater to precipitate minerals on whose surfaces organic molecules react.

We typically frame these surface reactions as affected by temperature, pH, and mineral catalysis, but many laboratory analog vent environments also sustain measurable electrical potentials, with the minerals forming these vents offering a conductive pathway for electrons to flow.

This matters because electrochemical boundary conditions can influence not just how fast reactions proceed, but which products form. That knowledge is essential for creating lab analogues of early Earth and interpreting data from ocean worlds in our solar system.

Astrobiology, astrogeology, astrochemistry,