Publication at Faculty of Science, Central Library of Charles University |
2019
Abstract
Besides delivering plausible prebiotic feedstock molecules and high-energy initiators, extraterrestrial impacts could also affect the process of abiogenesis by altering the early Earth's geological environment in which primitive life was conceived. We show that iron-rich smectites formed by reprocessing of basalts due to the residual post-impact heat could catalyze the synthesis and accumulation of important prebiotic building blocks such as nucleobases, amino acids and urea.