![]() This RNA-based life could have served as the descendants of the current life on Earth. One of the popular theories held today is the RNA world hypothesis, which suggests that primordial life was based on RNA because it can act as both genetic material and catalyst. The transition from non-living to living entities may have occurred gradually. The primordial soup is also the edict of the heterotrophic theory of the origin of life proposed by Alexander Oparin and John Burdon Sanderson Haldane. phospholipids forming lipid bilayers) and organic compounds from inorganic sources. Apparently, the simulated-primitive Earth favored the chemical syntheses of the basic structure of the cell membrane (e.g. A widely-accepted research finding is that of the Miller–Urey experiment. This soup served as a site where organic compounds were synthesized. The “primordial soup” refers to the hypothetical model of the primitive Earth wherein it accumulated organic material and water resembling a soup. Currently, living things are classified into three Domains: (Eu)Bacteria (true bacteria), Archaea (archaebacteria), and Eucarya ( eukaryotes). The fundamental characteristics are as follows: having an organized structure, requiring energy, responding to stimuli and adapting to environmental changes, and being capable of reproduction, growth, movement, metabolism, and death. “Living things that mimic non-living things”Ī living thing pertains to any organism or a life form that possesses or shows the characteristics of life or being alive.While an organic tomato harvested from a small farm may taste much better than one grown commercially and picked green, from a chemical standpoint, however, they are identical. Interestingly, the word organic has been taking on more of its much older (and less precise) meaning, as people now speak positively of the benefits of "organic gardening," " organic food," and "organic vitamins." This use of the term organic suggests that some sort of mysterious "vital" force is at work in these compounds that gives them special qualities that synthetic products do not have. Finally, the very chemistry that carries our genetic information-nucleic acids-are complex organic compounds made up of small molecules called nucleotides. Materials such as the cotton and wool in clothing, the petroleum for cars and factories, and all synthetic (man-made) drugs and plastics are organic compounds. Specifically, foods are all organic compounds since they are made up of carbohydrates, fats, and proteins. Today, it is known that all living things are not only organic compounds, but that they also are critically dependent on organic compounds. This led to the modern definition of what became the study of organic chemistry-the chemistry of carbon compounds. Eventually, it was learned that what was important was molecular structure, or the way the atoms arranged themselves into molecules. Starting with this laboratory breakthrough, science eventually came to recognize that no "vital force" was necessary for a substance to be considered an organic compound. That year, he quite unintentionally produced urea, an organic substance formed naturally in the bodies of mammals, in his laboratory using strictly inorganic substances. In 1828 the German chemist Friedrich Wohler (1800–1882) changed all of this thinking. Two hundred years ago, organic meant "vital," or "living." Therefore, in the past, an organic compound was the tissue or the remains of a living thing, while an inorganic compound was something lifeless like a rock or the waters of the earth. In those days, it was thought that some sort of "vital force" existed only in living things, and that it was this force that made living things uniquely capable of producing organic compounds. ![]() Until the nineteenth century, it was commonly believed that organic compounds only could be produced by something that was living. Scientists have already identified more than 1,000,000 organic compounds. ![]() Since it can also link up with other carbon atoms and form long, stable chains, the variety of combinations carbon can form with other elements is almost limitless. Because of its unique atomic structure (the way a single atom of carbon is built), a carbon atom is able to link up with as many as four other atoms of another element. There are four main types of organic compounds in living things: carbohydrates, proteins, lipids, and nucleic acids.Īn organic compound is a combination of carbon and almost any other element. All living things have an essential dependence on organic compounds, since carbon occurs in almost every chemical compound found in living things. Organic compounds are substances that contain carbon (a nonmetallic element that occurs in all plants and animals).
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