ORIGIN OF

LIFE
 THE CONCEPT OF LIFE

• Earth is much older than life. Based on radioactive

decay studies of rocks, it was revealed that Earth is
around 4.5 billion years old—1 billion years older
than the oldest fossils.
 THE CONCEPT OF LIFE
• There was no witness to the origin of life. However, there are
possible explanations that attempt different possibilities on how
life could have begun:

A. Extraterrestrial origin – The hypothesis explains that life

originated on another planet outside our Solar System. Life was
then carried to Earth on a meteorite or an asteroid and colonized
Earth.
B. Panspermia – The theory presumes that the “seed” of
life exists all over the universe and can be propagated
through space, and that life on Earth originated from
those seeds.
C. Divine creation- Many people believe that life
was put on Earth by divine forces. Creation theories
are common to many of the world’s religion and
cultures.
D. Origin from nonliving matter – Scientists
believe that life arose on Earth from inanimate
matter after Earth had cooled. They stated that
random events probably produced stable molecules
that could self-replicate. Then, natural selection
favored changes in the rate of reproduction, which
may eventually led to the first cell.
• Stanley Miller and Harold Urey – performed an experiment that
replicated early Earth conditions. The experiment provided a proof that
amino acids and other organic molecules could be formed.
• (Water was heated and the water vapor mixed with hydrogen, carbon
dioxide, carbon monoxide, nitrogen, ammonia, and methane. The
mixture of gases was sparked with electricity to simulate lightning.
The gases were cooled using a glass tube filled with circulating cold
water and a dark mixture containing amino acids and other complex
molecules were formed.)
How did the first cells form?
• The crucial feature that separates the cell from its environment is
the cell membrane, which contains lipids. Scientists think that
formation of tiny spheres of lipids may have been the first stage in
the origin of cell. When lipids mix with water, they form bubbles
called coacervate. These bubbles had double-layered members
similar to the lipid bilayer of the cell membrane.
• Scientist believe that the first cells were the prokaryotes –
organisms whose cells have no nucleus. The first
prokaryotes were anaerobic, which means they did not need
and could not tolerate free oxygen. Organisms that need
oxygen could not have survived because Earth lacked free
oxygen. Many anaerobic prokaryotes still live on Earth
today in places where there is no free oxygen.
 EARLY LIFE FORMS
• Biologists separate the bacteria into two groups according to the
composition of their cell walls and cell membranes, as well as in the
structure of some of their proteins.
1. Eubacteria – also known as the “true bacteria”. These includes
those bacteria that causes disease and decay.
2. Archaebacteria – “ancient bacteria”, are rare. They are found
mainly in hostile environments where conditions resemble those of
early Earth (e.g., salty lakes, hot springs, swamps, and ocean floor).
• Today, biologists believed that oxygen of early Earth’s
atmosphere was produced by bacteria. About 3 BYA, a
group of photosynthetic bacteria, known as cyanobacteria,
evolved.
• More complex life-forms appeared in the fossil record.
These organisms known as eukaryotes, were much larger
than prokaryotes, and they contained a central nucleus and a
complicated internal structure.
• The first living things to populate the surface of the land
were plants and fungi. The solution to the challenge of
living on dry land was a unique mutualistic partnership
between plants and fungi called mycorrhizae. Plants provide
food to the fungi while the fungi provide nutrients obtained
from organic matter to the plants.
• Animals soon followed plants onto land. The first
animals to leave the water were the arthropods
(animals with hard body covering and joint legs). The
first arthropods to live on lands were scorpions. They
are carnivorous relatives of spiders with two pincers
on their front legs and a venomous stinger at the end
of their tails.
• From the scorpions, a unique class of terrestrial arthropod
soon evolved, these are the insects. Based on fossil records
and studies, insects were the first animals to develop wings.
• More complex animals began to evolved and exists, these
are notochords. The notochords, however, exists only for a
short time. And is replaced by the vertebral column or
backbone. Chordates, or animals with notochords and
vertebral column, are called vertebrates.
• The earliest vertebrates were jawless fishes with bony
skeletons. Today, the jawless fishes are the eel-like, parasitic
lampreys, and the scavenging hagfishes.
• The first vertebrates on land were the amphibians about 350
MYA. Reptiles evolved from amphibians about 300 MYA.
The massive reptiles, known as dinosaurs, arose about 220
MYA. For more than 150 million years, mammals and
dinosaurs coexisted.
• Although most dinosaurs are now extinct,
descendants of small insect-eating dinosaurs still
exist: the birds. Bird feathers evolved from the same
scales that protected the dinosaurs as well. Birds,
mammals, and dinosaurs coexisted until the sudden
extinction of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago
during the Cretaceous period. This caused the birds
and mammals to diverge rapidly.
• CHARACTERISTICS OF LIFE
The characteristics common to all living things that are considered in the study of
life are cellular organization, metabolism, homeostasis, reproduction, and heredity.
a. CELLULAR ORGANIZATION
• All cells have the same basic structure: a membrane that encloses the cell and
controls materials that move in and out; an internal fluid known as cytoplasm
where the organelles are suspended; and a nucleus that contains the hereditary
genes called DNA.
• Organisms can either be either be made up of only one cell (unicellular) or made up
of many cells (multicellular).
•