[q-bio.PE] Agents that exert causal power in the world are thought to be the product of selection among diverse replicators; what is the causal structure of a medium before replicators […]
Biochemistry & Organic Chemistry
Posted inComets and Asteroids
Gelato: A Mission Concept for Comet Surface Sample Return
[The Planetary Science Journal] Understanding the role of comets in solar system formation and evolution has continued to be a driving question in planetary science. It is believed that comets […]
Posted inOrigin & Evolution of Life
Liquid–liquid Phase Separation As A Driver Of Abiogenesis And Evolution
[Academia Molecular Biology and Genomics] The origin of life may have emerged through physical mechanisms that enable molecular organization and self-assembly.
Posted inOrigin & Evolution of Life
Flavin Cycling Under Prebiotic Conditions: Bidirectional Electron Transfer And Versatility In Nickel and Iron Containing Environments
[biorxiv.org] Flavins are organic redox cofactors central to metabolism and uniquely capable of acting as extracellular electron shuttles. For life to have emerged, it must have disengaged itself from its […]
Posted inAstrochemistry
Chemical Modelling Of Interstellar MgS
[astro-ph.GA] The detection of magnesium sulphide (MgS) and sodium sulphide (NaS) towards the Galactic Center molecular cloud G+0.693 constitutes the first detection of metal sulphides in the interstellar medium (ISM).
Posted inAstropharmacy / Biotechnology
Pigmented Fungi Derived From Hot And Cold deserts Ecosystems: Taxonomy, Genomic And Biotechnological Approach
[World Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology] Safer and more efficient products and processes are current global demands that drive the field of bioprospective research. Microbial sources are the main natural […]
![Schematic diagram of our spectral line stacking and matched filtering procedures. First, (a) shows relevant spectral regions of the (synthetic) observational data (black) and an initial spectral simulation (red). Each spectral window is then weighted based on the signal-to-noise ratio of each region to create a velocity stack of all relevant molecular rotational transitions (b). Finally, the stacked simulation is used as a matched filter and is cross-correlated with the stacked data to visualize the statistical significance of a given detection (c). -- [astro-ph.GA]](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/08/Exploring-the-Limits.png?resize=1200%2C720&ssl=1)
Posted inAstrochemistry
Exploring the Limits of Spectral Line Stacking in Spectral Line Data and Application Toward the Detection of Bulk 13C Enrichment of Aromatics in TMC-1
[astro-ph.GA] The formation history of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in the interstellar medium remains a topic of active debate, with proposed mechanisms ranging from high-temperature stellar ejecta processes to low-temperature […]
![Helicity asymmetries of the primordial (left panel) and late-time (right panel) density fields for parity asymmetric (blue curves) and symmetric (red curves) simulations. The shaded regions indicate the standard deviation (1σ) of the ensemble-average. The red markers highlight the asymmetries exceeding a statistical significance of 3σ. - [astro-ph.CO]](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/Probing.png?resize=1200%2C718&ssl=1)
Posted inAstrochemistry
Probing Primordial Chirality in the Matter Distribution
[astro-ph.CO] Whether parity symmetry was violated in the early universe remains one of the fundamental open questions in cosmology. If so, it may leave an intrinsic handedness in the large-scale […]
Posted inOrigin & Evolution of Life
Oil Droplets Remodel Themselves, And Swallow Their Surroundings – Like Living Cells
[New York University] NYU researchers have made microscopic oil droplets in water do something usually reserved for living cells: change shape in complex, controllable ways, and even engulf their surroundings.
![Three-dimensional thermal phase architecture of the local ISM. (a) Three-dimensional rendering of the cold (blue) and unstable (yellow) isosurfaces, with warm gas shown transparent. The transparent warm volume traces WNM together with unmodelled hot ionised gas, which carries negligible mass (Methods). An interactive version is available at https://sb2580.github.io/phases 3d/. (b) Slices through the Galactic plane (𝑧 = 0) of gas density 𝑛 (left), FUV radiation intensity 𝐼UV (middle), and phase classification (right). Concentric circles mark heliocentric radii of 150, 300, and 450 pc. -- [astro-ph.GA]](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/The-first-three.png?resize=1200%2C719&ssl=1)
Posted inAstrochemistry
The First Three-dimensional Map Of Thermal Phases In The Local Interstellar Medium
[astro-ph.GA] The thermal state of interstellar gas controls whether it remains warm and diffuse or cools into dense clouds. Twentyone centimetre observations have established a statistical picture of neutral-gas phases, […]