Primordial Soup

Primordial soup - just one theory about how we came to be.

• The atmosphere was rich in nitrogen, hydrogen, ammonia and methane.
• Lightning struck which caused a chemical reaction between the gases, forming amino acids, the building blocks of all life.
• These amino acids formed a body of water called primordial soup.
• They combined to produce organic matter, which evolved into simple organisms.

Miller and Urey - the experiment

To test this theory, Miller and Urey put these gases in their apparatus, heated them and applied an electrical charge for a week.

Amino acids were produced but there weren't nearly as many as there are on Earth. Also, we don't know if there was continuous lightning to react the gases back then. Finally, they only used the gases that they knew would produce amino acids and no others, so the experiment cannot be seen as accurate. As interesting as it was, it was not accurate.