Role of stellar physics in regulating the critical steps for life
Open accessAbstract
We use the critical step model to study the major transitions in evolution on Earth. We find that a total of five steps represents the most plausible estimate, in agreement with previous studies, and use the fossil record to identify the potential candidates. We apply the model to Earth-analogs around stars of different masses by incorporating the constraints on habitability set by stellar physics including the habitable zone lifetime, availability of ultraviolet radiation for prebiotic chemistry, and atmospheric escape. The critical step model suggests that the habitability of Earth-analogs around M-dwarfs is significantly suppressed. The total number of stars with planets containing detectable biosignatures of microbial life is expected to be highest for K-dwarfs. In contrast, we find that the corresponding value for intelligent life (technosignatures) should be highest for solar-mass stars. Thus, our work may assist in the identification of suitable targets in the search for biosignatures and technosignatures.
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There may be an anthropic selection effect favoring earlier abiogenesis on Earth, because an intelligent life must emerge before the increasing solar luminosity causes an end to Earth's habitable state.
“There may also be an anthropic selection effect favoring earlier abiogenesis on Earth, because an intelligent life must emerge before the increasing solar luminosity causes an end to Earth’s habitable state (estimated to be ~1 Gyr in future)31.”
From Emergence of life in an inflationary universe (2020) · cites this paper as [31]
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Pogge von Strandmann, P. A. E., Stüeken, E. E., Elliott, T., Poulton, S. W., Dehler, C. M., Canfield, D. E., & Catling, D. C. (2015) · Nature Communications · doi:10.1038/ncomms10157 · Cited by 111 · see citing works
Synthesis of aldehydic ribonucleotide and amino acid precursors by photoredox chemistry
Ritson, D. J., & Sutherland, J. D. (2013) · Angewandte Chemie International Edition · doi:10.1002/anie.201300321 · Cited by 104 · cited 1× · see citing works
“…and β-ribonucleosides (Powner et al. 2009; Xu et al. 2017), (ii) building blocks of sugars, such as glycolaldehyde and glyceraldehyde (Ritson and Sutherland 2012, 2013; Todd et al. 2018; Xu et al. 2018), (iii) precursors of nucleic acids, amino acids, lipids and carbohydrates (Barks…”
BackgroundRios, A. C., & Tor, Y. (2013) · Israel Journal of Chemistry · doi:10.1002/ijch.201300009 · Cited by 98 · see citing works
Origins of life: a problem for physics, a key issues review
Walker, S. I. (2017) · Reports on Progress in Physics · doi:10.1088/1361-6633/aa7804 · Cited by 94 · cited 2× · see citing works
“The issue of whether abiogenesis is an ‘easy’ or a ‘hard’ phenomenon remains currently unresolved (Walker 2017), but resolving this question will have important implications for gauging the likelihood of extraterrestrial life (Lineweaver and Davis 2002; Davies 2003; Spiegel and Turner 2012; Chen…”
BackgroundFalse Negatives for Remote Life Detection on Ocean-Bearing Planets: Lessons from the Early Earth
Reinhard, C. T., Olson, S. L., Schwieterman, E. W., & Lyons, T. W. (2017) · Astrobiology · doi:10.1089/ast.2016.1598 · Cited by 93 · see citing works
Life on a Young Planet: The First Three Billion Years of Evolution on Earth
Knoll, A. H. (2015) · doi:10.1515/9781400866045 · Cited by 89 · see citing works
Mimicking the Surface and Prebiotic Chemistry of Early Earth Using Flow Chemistry
Ritson, D. J., Battilocchio, C., Ley, S. V., & Sutherland, J. D. (2018) · Nature Communications · doi:10.1038/s41467-018-04147-2 · Cited by 89 · see citing works
ABOUT EXOBIOLOGY: THE CASE FOR DWARF K STARS
Cuntz, M., & Guinan, E. F. (2016) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/0004-637x/827/1/79 · Cited by 77 · cited 1× · see citing works
“Our analysis and conclusions are in agreement with previous studies of this subject (Huang 1959; Dole 1964; Kasting et al. 1993; Heller and Armstrong 2014; Tian and Ida 2015; Cuntz and Guinan 2016; Lingam and Loeb 2017b).”
ResultNucleobase and amino acid formation through impacts of meteorites on the early ocean
Furukawa, Y., Nakazawa, H., Sekine, T., Kobayashi, T., & Kakegawa, T. (2015) · Earth and Planetary Science Letters · doi:10.1016/j.epsl.2015.07.049 · Cited by 67 · see citing works
Environmental Adaptation from the Origin of Life to the Last Universal Common Ancestor
Cantine, M. D., & Fournier, G. P. (2018) · Origins of Life and Evolution of Biospheres · doi:10.1007/s11084-017-9542-5 · Cited by 54 · see citing works
Nitrogen in Ancient Mud: A Biosignature?
Stüeken, E. E. (2016) · Astrobiology · doi:10.1089/ast.2016.1478 · Cited by 32 · see citing works
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Emergence of life in an inflationary universe
Totani, T. (2020) · Scientific Reports · doi:10.1038/s41598-020-58060-0 · Cited by 29 · see citing works
“ffect favoring earlier abiogenesis on Earth, because an intelligent life must emerge before the increasing solar luminosity causes an end to Earth’s habitable state (estimated to be ∼ 1 Gyr in future) [30]. For the case of a low abiogenesis rate, the number of abiogenesis events is often considered in the Milky Way Gal…”
Background
- Authors
- Lingam, M., & Loeb, A.
- Affiliations
- Harvard University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Lingam, Manasvi
- Venue
- International Journal of Astrobiology
- Publisher
- Cambridge University Press (CUP)
- Published
- 2019-03-27
- Volume
- 18
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 527-546
- ISSN
- 1473-5504 (ISSN-L)
- 1475-3006
- OpenAlex
- W2795482385
- Cited by
- 25
- References
- 89
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 1 · 2023: 3 · 2021: 4 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 6 · 2018: 1
- FWCI
- 2.00
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- arxiv.org
- Locations
- International Journal of Astrobiology (publishedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University) (submittedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Space Science and Extraterrestrial Life
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Origins and Evolution of Life
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Stellar, planetary, and galactic studies
- Keywords
- origin of life, major transitions, habitability, M dwarfs, K dwarfs, stellar mass, ultraviolet radiation, prebiotic chemistry, atmospheric escape, biosignatures, technosignatures, Earth analogs, search for life
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
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