Ingredients for microbial life preserved in 3.5 billion-year-old fluid inclusions.

ABSTRACT: It is widely hypothesised that primeval life utilised small organic molecules as sources of carbon and energy. However, the presence of such primordial ingredients in early Earth habitats has not yet been demonstrated. Here we report the existence of indigenous organic molecules and gases in primary fluid inclusions in c. 3.5-billion-year-old barites (Dresser Formation, Pilbara Craton, Western Australia). The compounds identified (e.g., H₂S, COS, CS₂, CH₄, acetic acid, organic (poly-)sulfanes, thiols) may have formed important substrates for purported ancestral sulfur and methanogenic metabolisms. They also include stable building blocks of methyl thioacetate (methanethiol, acetic acid) - a putative key agent in primordial energy metabolism and thus the eme

SUBMITTER: Mißbach H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7889642 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature