Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Foreword
- Preface
- Part I What is life?
- Part II Astronomical and geophysical context of the emergence of life
- Part III The role of water in the emergence of life
- 13 Liquid water: a necessary condition for all forms of life?
- 14 The role of water in the formation and evolution of planets
- 15 Water on Mars
- Part IV From non-living systems to life
- Part V Mechanisms for life evolution
- Part VI Life in extreme conditions
- Part VII Traces of life and biosignatures
- Part VIII Life elsewhere?
- Index
13 - Liquid water: a necessary condition for all forms of life?
from Part III - The role of water in the emergence of life
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 February 2011
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Foreword
- Preface
- Part I What is life?
- Part II Astronomical and geophysical context of the emergence of life
- Part III The role of water in the emergence of life
- 13 Liquid water: a necessary condition for all forms of life?
- 14 The role of water in the formation and evolution of planets
- 15 Water on Mars
- Part IV From non-living systems to life
- Part V Mechanisms for life evolution
- Part VI Life in extreme conditions
- Part VII Traces of life and biosignatures
- Part VIII Life elsewhere?
- Index
Summary
Introduction
In a paper entitled ‘The prospect of alien life in exotic forms on other worlds’ published in 2006, the authors write:
The nature of life on Earth provides a singular example of carbon-based, water-borne, photosynthesis-driven biology. Within our understanding of chemistry and the physical laws governing the universe, however, lies the possibility that alien life could be based on different chemistries, solvents, and energy sources from the one example provided by Terran biology.
(Schulze-Makuch and Irwin, 2006)Similar comments can be found in several papers (Bains, 2004).
We are not planning to address the possibility of an alien life, but wish to focus on the issue of the solvent in order to try to demonstrate that water is an essential component of all living systems. Living systems are complex both at the molecular and supra-molecular levels (Schulze-Makuch and Irwin, 2006). Water plays, at both these levels, a role which is crucial for the structure, the stability and the biological function of all molecules that are essential for life, a role that cannot be played by any other solvent or any other molecule.
A solvent is never an inert medium and always interacts with the solute molecules. These interactions affect not only the solute but also the solvent. Water is a unique solvent because solute-induced modifications are very important in this medium.
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- Origins and Evolution of LifeAn Astrobiological Perspective, pp. 205 - 217Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2011
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