Making Habitable Worlds: An Astrochemical Perspective

This seminar is part of the EAI on-line seminars

By Dmitry Semenov, MPIA, Germany

10 October 2023, 16:00 CEST

The origin of life on Earth can be traced back to at least 3.5 billion years ago, and, possibly, to as early as 3.6–4.0 billion years ago. The early onset of abiogenesis implies that the key life-building blocks have been readily available on the early Earth. It is commonly believed nowadays that Earth has formed in the inner, warm part of the solar nebula from the pebbles and planetesimals lacking volatiles, and got a substantial fraction (if not all) of the surface water and carbon via exogenous delivery by comets and asteroids. The question remains, however, whether prebiotic organics crucial for abiogenesis have been also delivered along or have been synthesized in situ from atmospheric and volcanic gases. In my presentation, I will talk about our current understanding of the cosmic life-cycle of organic matter, starting from molecular clouds to planet-forming disks and the solar nebula and, finally, to asteroids and the early Earth.