Evaluating Alternatives to Water as Solvents for Life: The Example of Sulfuric Acid.

ABSTRACT: The chemistry of life requires a solvent, which for life on Earth is water. Several alternative solvents have been suggested, but there is little quantitative analysis of their suitability as solvents for life. To support a novel (non-terrestrial) biochemistry, a solvent must be able to form a stable solution of a diverse set of small molecules and polymers, but must not dissolve all molecules. Here, we analyze the potential of concentrated sulfuric acid (CSA) as a solvent for biochemistry. As CSA is a highly effective solvent but a reactive substance, we focused our analysis on the stability of chemicals in sulfuric acid, using a model built from a database of kinetics of reaction of molecules with CSA. We consider the sulfuric acid clouds of Venus as a test case for this approach. The la

SUBMITTER: Bains W 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8145300 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature